The Lone World

(Ark Royal, Book XIV)

Christopher G. Nuttall

Book One: Ark Royal

Book Two: The Nelson Touch

Book Three: The Trafalgar Gambit

Book Four: Warspite

Book Five: A Savage War of Peace

Book Six: A Small Colonial War

Book Seven: Vanguard

Book Eight: Fear God And Dread Naught

Book Nine: We Lead

Book Ten: The Longest Day

Book Eleven: The Cruel Stars

Book Twelve: Invincible

Book Thirteen: Para Bellum

Book Fourteen: The Right of the Line

Book Fifteen: The Lion and the Unicorn

Book Sixteen: Fighting For The Crown

Book Seventeen: Drake’s Drum

Book Eighteen: Endeavour

Book Nineteen: The Lone World

––––––––

http://www.chrishanger.net

http://chrishanger.wordpress.com/

http://www.facebook.com/ChristopherGNuttall

Cover by Justin Adams

http://www.variastudios.com/

All Comments Welcome!

Cover Blurb

On her first deep-space mission, HMS Endeavour discovered two alien Dyson Spheres: one shattered, apparently nothing more than rubble orbiting a dying star; one seemingly intact, maintained by ancient super-technology so far advanced it may be beyond comprehension, inhabited by humans kidnapped from Earth hundreds of thousands of years ago. 

Nearly trapped within the sphere, Endeavour barely escaped, leaving behind a disturbing mystery.  It is a mystery that must be solved – and quickly.

Now, months later, a multinational task force is heading out to the spheres.  It’s mission: to unravel the secrets of the alien technology, to determine who built the spheres and why and, perhaps most importantly, if they are still watching their creations, silently judging the visitors to their worlds.  But with the secret of super-tech up for grabs, and human nations and factions gambling everything on getting the tech first, everything hangs in the balance ...

... And the spheres are waiting to see who’ll be the first to take what they can for themselves.

Prologue I

From: Admiral Paul Mason, Director of Alpha Black, Special Projects

To: Admiral Susan Onarina, First Space Lord

Note: Personal Message, Top Secret

Susan,

I wish I could offer you a preliminary report on the Dyson System and the Dyson Spheres – one intact and populated, one seemingly in ruins – based on data gathered by HMS Endeavour during her voyage to Dyson.  Unfortunately, I cannot.  The sheer volume of data gathered – which has almost certainly not scratched the surface – makes it impossible to draw any real conclusions.  We are left, instead, with a disturbing mystery.  Frankly, I feel like the fisherman who went fishing for minnows and somehow dragged from the water a very angry shark.  Even if there is no guiding intelligence surviving within the sphere, the fact remains the mere existence of alien supertechnology – still working, after untold millions of years – will upset the balance of power, as well as our understanding of the universe, beyond all hope of repair.

It is hard, even, to know when and where to begin.

Certain things are clear, right from the start.  The Dyson Aliens – termed the Builders – developed gravity control to a level so far in advance of our own that the Catapult, the most advanced gravity manipulation device we have designed and built, looks like nothing more than sticks and stones.  The material they used to build the spheres – termed Unobtainium by someone who clearly had too much time on his hands – has defied analysis, but is effectively indestructible, at least to human technology.  They use focused gravity beams to steer objects around the interior of the sphere – including solid spheres termed Fists, which appear to be designed to protect the surface from falling rocks – and, we assume, laid down an extended tramline.  We can also deduce that they are capable of both opening wormholes on a planetary scale – every star system near Dyson has been largely swept clear, with nothing larger than a small comet logged by human probes – and using gravity beams to tear apart planets and asteroids for raw materials.  I submit to you that it is not in Britain’s interests to let anyone get their hands on such technology.

Worse, however, is the presence of human settlers on the intact sphere. 

They are clearly human, although there are some divergent traces in their DNA that suggests they were taken from Earth hundreds of thousands of years ago.  (Their architecture bears a certain resemblance to Native American designs, specifically Aztec, Inca and Maya, but we believe this is merely a coincidence.)  The simple fact we encountered them on the very first – unplanned – landing on the sphere suggests human settlements are widespread, although we cannot be sure.  The possibility of running into other species – known and unknown – cannot be ruled out.  Long-range sensors were inconclusive and indeed, there is some speculation that the Builders were actively interfering with the sensors.  It cannot be proven one way or the other. 

We don’t know why these humans were taken from Earth and settled on the sphere.  We do know they were placed in a trap.  They lack the raw materials to develop anything more advanced than bows and arrows – before our team arrived, they didn’t even have the wheel – and there was no hope of them ever managing to climb out of the gravity well.  It is true that certain mountains on the sphere reach up into low orbit, or the local counterpart, but anyone without proper survival gear would perish well before they reached a point where they could launch themselves into space.  Even if they did, the automated defences would likely fire on them.  It was very lucky, to say the least, that Endeavour was able to recover her crewmen and escape before she was destroyed. 

It is easy to argue that the Builders passed through the Sol System hundreds of thousands of years ago and that they are no longer around today.  The apparent collapse of Dyson One – and the presumed death of its entire population – certainly suggests the Builders are no longer interested in maintaining their technology.  That may be true, although the mere fact that someone kidnapped a breeding population from Earth should be worrying even if they became extinct long before we had even the merest hint of their existence.  Did they want to preserve samples of our biosphere (and presumably others)?  Did they want to save us from ourselves, as some insist, or did they want to put humans in zoos?  We have done as much, to species we considered lesser – and to a species that builds on their scale, we must look very lesser indeed.

And yet, we are left with a disturbing mystery.  The Builders were clearly interested in monitoring the Virus, without seeming to do anything to stop it.  They left artefacts of unknown purpose within a number of systems, artefacts that were only discovered through chance.  (I should add, at this point, that some researchers believe it wasn’t chance; the artefacts chose to reveal themselves to us.)  If there are similar artefacts within our own systems, and those of our alien allies, they have yet to be found.  I am not optimistic about locating them, if indeed they exist.  They may be remarkable, but they are little more than dust mites on the scale of an entire solar system.

I believe that solving the mystery behind the Dyson Spheres and their Builders must now become our priority.  It is vitally important we track down the Builders to ask them some pointed questions or confirm to our own satisfaction they are truly gone.  A secondary priority, of course, is to master their technology for ourselves.  If we succeed in doing so, there will be no limits; contrariwise, if someone else masters it first, the entire Royal Navy will become obsolete overnight.  The alien energy weapons, observed during the first exploration of the sphere, are powerful enough to slice through a battleship effortlessly ... and that, I’m afraid, is only just scratching the surface.  We could be on the brink of a full-fledged Lensmen Arms Race – or about to be crushed effortlessly.  It did not take even a day for my researchers to come up with interesting and lethal uses of observed alien technology.  I dare say other countries are already coming up with their own ideas.

With that in mind, I have the following suggestions ...

Prologue II: Beijing, China

There were no visible security measures, as Admiral He Tianya stepped into the government penthouse, but he wasn’t fool enough to think they didn’t exist.  The city had been the core of China’s government for so long the security forces had no trouble in controlling everything from the government complexes to the universities, factories and the slums beyond the security barriers.  There was no privacy, not even for the elite.  Nothing was said or done, nothing at all, that was not recorded in a government database and cross-checked by algorithms primed to watch for potential dissidents.  It was impossible for dissidents to exist, he’d been assured; the slightest hint of dissidence was enough to get someone exiled to the work camps, or simply blacklisted until they saw fit to submit themselves for re-education. And the algorithms were never wrong ...

He schooled his face into a mask as he looked around the luxurious office, promising himself – once again – that one day he’d have such an office himself.  No expense had been spared, from the wooden desk to the comfortable chairs, drinks cabinet and fancy paintings lining the walls.  A couple had been changed, he noted, since his last visit.  His eyes lingered on the missing faces, all too aware it was the only clue he’d have to how power had shifted over the last few months.  The Committee’s inner workings and debates were never shared with outsiders.  Their decisions, when made, were presented unanimously.

“Admiral,” the Chairman said.  His voice was soft, almost polite, with nary a hint he could have Tianya – or anyone – dragged away and shot on a whim.  He looked like a businessman in a simple black suit, but it was so elegantly tailored that anyone who looked at him would know he was a man of wealth and power.  “Please.  Be seated.”

Tianya took a seat, bracing himself.  It was unlikely he’d been summoned for a dressing down from the Chairman himself, not when he knew he’d done nothing worthy of a private scolding.  Besides, if he had, he’d have been quietly escorted away and disappeared.  No one would have lifted a finger in his defence, if the Committee wanted him gone.  And that meant ...

The Chairman said nothing for a long moment, then tapped his console.  A holographic image appeared in front of them, a pair of Dyson Spheres.  Tianya fought to keep his expression under tight control.  The spheres were a work of engineering so far in advance of humanity’s that he knew there was no way they could be matched, not now and perhaps never.  He’d heard the early reports, passed through international communications channels, and wondered – despite himself – if they were hoaxes.  It wouldn’t be the first time someone had reported something incredible, and impossible.  Giant alien starships, omnipotent entities bent on testing humanity ... none, somehow, allowing themselves to be recorded.  But if the Chairman believed the spheres were real.

“The British dispatched a deep-space survey vessel into the region beyond Virus Prime,” the Chairman said.  “Our intelligence suggested they knew something and so we assigned a starship to shadow their ship at a safe distance.  Haikou followed them through an impossible tramline and found an even more impossible pair of Dyson Spheres; one cracked and broken, the other with a human population.  I would not have believed it if we hadn’t had reports from our own ship.”

“Yes, sir,” Tianya said.  His mind raced.  Why was the Chairman discussing the matter with him?  It had been highly-classified, of course – he hadn’t heard anything about the spheres on the public datanet and he doubted he ever would – but it didn’t need the Chairman’s personal attention.  “The report is quite remarkable.”

“Yes,” the Chairman agreed.  “Advanced technology, at least thousands of years old, and still functional.  Could anything of ours last so long?”

Tianya considered it, briefly.  “No, sir,” he said.  “Certainly nothing on the same scale.”

“And the potential of the technology is staggering,” the Chairman added.  For the first time, there was a hint of emotion in his voice.  “What could we do with such power?  What could we not do?”

“It would be incredible,” Tianya agreed, studying the hologram.  The largest man-made structure was the Heinlein Shipyard, put together by the United States Navy ... and the Dyson Spheres made it look like a children’s toy.  “We could do anything.”

The Chairman nodded, slowly.  Tianya looked at him and had a sudden flash of insight.  The Chairman was as close to omnipotent as any human ever became, a man with more personal power than anyone else on the planet.  The American President or the British Prime Minister were powerful, too, but their power was hedged by checks and balances designed to prevent them from becoming tyrants.  The Chairman had no such formal barriers to supreme power.  As long as he was careful, and kept the Committee from uniting against him, he could do pretty much whatever he liked.  China was lucky, Tianya supposed, that the Chairman had few vices.  He could have surrounded himself with wealth beyond the dreams of the empires of old, a harem of women, or ... or anything, anything at all.  Power was his one real vice ...

... And the Builders made him look like an ant.

Tianya had been a spacer too long to risk deluding himself.  The Builders had casually dismantled a number of planets, just to build a pair of Dyson Spheres.  The Builders had warped space itself, laying down at least one extended tramline, and swept the known universe and beyond for intelligent life to populate their spheres.  He had no idea if the dismantled worlds had had intelligent life of their own – intelligence was relatively rare – but there was no way to be sure.  China was a superpower, one of the three most powerful nations on Earth and beyond, and the Builders could crush her effortlessly.  They might not even notice!  And the Chairman, the most powerful man on the planet, was nothing to them.

It was hard, even for an experienced officer, to keep his thoughts under control.  The sheer size of the sphere was daunting.  How much worse must it be, he wondered, to climb to the top of the tree, only to discover it wasn’t the biggest tree in the wood?  He’d wondered, once, why so many of his ancestors hadn’t tried to adapt, when the westerners arrived to impose unequal treaties and threaten to carve up their country into colonies.  He knew now.  And the gulf between China and the West had been tiny, compared to the gap between mankind and the Builders.  It might never be surmounted.

“You have been selected for a very special mission,” the Chairman said.  “If you succeed, and return in triumph, you will be rewarded with a seat on the Committee.  If you fail, and survive, you will be disavowed.”

Tianya felt his heart begin to race.  A seat on the Committee ...?  A chance to take his place amongst the most powerful men in the country?  A wife from a powerful bloodline, children educated amongst the elite and groomed to replace them?  He’d kill for such a reward.  It was worth any risk ...

The Chairman kept speaking.  “The British have technically broken the Solar Treaty.  Technically.  We have kindly refrained from making a fuss, save for lodging a single diplomatic protest.  Indeed, we have pretended to accept their excuses on the matter and agreed to let it rest.  For now.  We have chosen to do so because we want to send our own people to Dyson, in the spirit of international cooperation.  You will assume command of our team and, possibly, receive a position within the Multi-National Force command structure.  We will make a big show of cooperating with the rest of humanity.”

He paused and met Tianya’s eyes.  “No one will know you have other orders.”

Tianya took a breath.  He wasn’t blind to the risks.  If the mission failed, there would be no rewards.  Not for him.  He’d be blamed for the catastrophe, declared a rogue agent and effectively unpersoned.  His victories would be given to someone else, his family would be told they no longer had a son, his friends and enemies alike would know to pretend he’d never existed ... if the reward was so high, the punishment for failure would be truly dreadful.  No wonder the Chairman was giving Tianya his orders in person, rather than letting them be passed through the regular chain of command.  If the mission failed, no one outside a very select circle would ever know it had ever been attempted.

The reward is worth the risk, he told himself.  If he failed, it would be better to eat his own gun than return home.  I can do it.

The Chairman smiled, very slightly.  His tone was very formal.  “Admiral.  This is what I want you to do ...”

Chapter One: London, United Kingdom

“And thank God that’s over,” Admiral Lady Susan Onarina said, as she strode into her suite and closed the door behind her.  “I thought it would never end.”

“Cruel and unusual punishment?”  Admiral Paul Mason sat on a sofa, reading the latest set of reports from the Alpha Black team.  “How badly are we fucked?”

Susan shrugged off her jacket and switched on the kettle.  Technically, as a flag officer, she was entitled to a private steward, but she’d never been particularly comfortable around servants.  Having one onboard ship was a marvellous time saver yet having one in London bred indolence and bad attitudes.  Besides, it wasn’t as if she could take her servants with her when she finally retired.  She didn’t have the funds to maintain them.

“Not as badly as you might expect,” she said, as she found a pair of mugs and dropped teabags into them.  “The Russians have lodged a series of formal complaints, demanding everything from monetary compensation to our exclusion from the research team, but they’re more or less alone.  The Americans have tut-tutted and the French have muttered angrily, yet there’s no appetite for any real sanctions.”

Mason caught her eye.  “The Chinese said nothing?”

“They just lodged a single protest,” Susan said.  It was odd, to say the least.  The Chinese government was known for being prickly, although it was also known for evading the spirit of the law whenever it thought it could get away with it.  “The Foreign Office believes the Chinese don’t want to have to explain why they didn’t blow the whistle on us, given that they clearly knew we were up to something.  We could certainly hint we let the Chinese find out deliberately, or so they argue.”

“No one would buy that,” Mason objected.  “It’s insane.”

Susan made a face.  MI5 had been going through the handful of people who knew about the artefacts, and the map leading to Dyson, but so far they’d drawn a blank.  The spy, if there was one, remained resolutely unidentified.  And that meant ... she hated the thought of the Chinese corrupting one of her people, but if they’d managed to break the navy’s encryption codes it would be a great deal worse.  How many secrets had been accidentally shared, because the navy thought its codes were unbreakable?  The Chinese had hinted it was just a coincidence – Haikou just happened to be following Endeavour – but Susan would believe that the day she had her head cut off and replaced with a cabbage.  No one would dispatch a cruiser on a long-term shadowing mission like that unless they expected the survey ship to find something a great deal more interesting than an uninhabited or infected world. 

No, she thought grimly.  They knew the mission was more than just a routine survey flight before the vessel was dispatched.

“People have been known to believe seventeen impossible things before breakfast,” she said, pouring boiling water into the mugs.  “It might make the Chinese a little more suspicious of anything they get from their spy.  If there is a spy.”

“Hah,” Mason said.  “They already know the bastard’s reliable.”

He took the mug she passed him and sat back on the sofa.  “So ... how bad is it?”

“There are already a bunch of private parties heading out to the spheres,” Susan said.  “The Admiralty has declared a no-entry zone, and the other countries have followed suit, but hardly anyone is paying attention.  The Belters don’t recognise our authority in such matters, the lesser powers feel excluded and the big corporations think they can get away with defying us if they find something within the system they can use as a bargaining chip.  It’s only a matter of time before the Tadpoles or the Foxes get involved – they probably have ships on their way already.  The government intends to act decisively.”

Mason shrugged.  “They do realise just how big the binary system is, don’t they?”

“Um ... maybe?”  Susan smiled, although she felt little real humour.  “They don’t know what to think.  They’re hypnotised by the thought of someone stumbling across an alien database, unlocking it and finding a complete how-to-build-a-sphere guide.”

“And the odds of that are ...?”

“Incalculable,” Susan said.  “If you picked up a book on Earth, what are the odds of it telling you how to build a starship?”

She sighed as she sipped her tea.  Groundhogs didn’t – couldn’t – understand the sheer size of a star system.  The biggest starship humanity had built and launched was infinitesimally tiny compared to Earth, let alone the rest of the system.  The two spheres encompassed a vast amount of space and sorting through the ruined sphere alone would take centuries, if they were lucky.  It might be impossible to catalogue and survey every last piece of debris.  The odds of finding a database, and working out how to read it, were low.

But the politicians think it isn’t impossible and they might be right, Susan thought.  We simply don’t know.

“You could learn a lot about us from reading a random book,” Mason pointed out.  “Our hopes and fears.  How our culture works.  What we can imagine ... maybe not the best example, but still ...”

“It depends,” Susan said.  “Remember those books that got passed around in the academy?”

Mason snorted.  “The aliens will take one look ... and declare war.”

“Probably.”  Susan took another sip of her tea.  “Bottom line is, we’re going back to the sphere.  Quite why it took two months to make a decision every last member of the international community knew was inevitable right from the start is beyond me, but...” she shrugged, “we’re going back.  Once we get there, the MNF will assume control of the twin system and chase everyone else out, then proceed to investigate the spheres.  Everyone who takes part in the mission will have full access to everything we find, which probably won’t keep people from cheating if they think they can get away with it.”

“Of course not,” Mason said.  “And the plan to settle the sphere?”

“Discarded, for the moment,” Susan said.  “Hopefully, no one will ever try.”

She scowled as she remembered the landing party’s report.  The sphere was a trap.  The locals lacked metals and chemistry and could never progress beyond a certain point, let alone climb out of the sphere’s gravity well and into orbit.  They were completely at the mercy of whoever had built the sphere, unable to escape if the technology failed a second time.  Susan had spent longer considering the implications of that than she wanted.  Was the sphere a wilderness preserve, a zoo, or a prison?  The latter worried her.  Who would want to lock up the human race?

“The Americans nominated Admiral Dismukes as Mission Commander,” she said, changing the subject.  “We supported them, as did the French, so he’ll probably be in overall command of the deployment.  The Chinese are pushing hard to nominate his deputy and they’ll probably succeed.  The Russians are backing them and the French are likely to do so when the time comes.  I doubt we’ll be able to get someone in the higher chain of command.  We already have the ambassadorial post.”

Mason looked thoughtful.  “Admiral Dismukes?  Do we know him?”

“The files are a little vague,” Susan said.  “There’s no mention of any major naval commands during the wars.  Apparently, he was in command of the Foreign Technology Division until recently.  My guess is he’s your counterpart.”

“Probably,” Mason said.  “Alpha Black and the FTD do pretty much the same thing.  He’s a good choice, if he’s deeply invested in their work.”

“Perhaps,” Susan said.  “He may be more of a bureaucrat or politician than a military leader.”

“Or a diplomat,” Mason pointed out.  “He’ll have to get people from at least five countries working together and keep them reasonably honest, even when they have one hell of an incentive to cheat.”

Susan scowled.  “Quite.”

She leaned forward.  “What do you make of it?”

“Truth is, I don’t know where to begin.”  Mason stared down at his empty mug.  “The Tadpoles were more advanced than us, when we met them, but we closed the gap fairly quickly.  The Foxes and the Cows were at roughly the same level, save for the FTL transmitters.  So was the Virus.  The Vesy, of course, were a long way behind when they discovered us, or – more accurately – we discovered them.  And the result was shattering.”

Susan grimaced.  There’d been loud voices demanding that the Vesy be left alone, to grow and develop on their own, but they’d been drowned out by people insisting the Vesy be uplifted to match humanity and the other known intelligent races.  The results had been mixed.  There had been some improvements, but the native culture had taken a beating and there was a very real risk it would never recover.  Susan suspected the Vesy might never make something of themselves, not now.  They’d just grow into a carbon copy of their human masters. 

“You think that could happen to us?”  Susan didn’t want to believe it, but she had to admit the possibility.  Her ancestors hadn’t coped well with meeting a more advanced society.  “That we could be just ... overshadowed by the Builders?”

“They built a pair of Dyson Spheres,” Mason pointed out.  “They extended a tramline or created one ... somehow.  What else can they do?  Could we do that, if we tried?”

“No.”  Susan didn’t have to think about it.  “Not yet.”

“Yes,” Mason agreed.  “And they took humans from their homeworld and set them up on the sphere.  There’s already people claiming the Builders built us.”

Susan snorted.  “Don’t they know how evolution works?”

“No.”  Mason chuckled.  “Why do you ask?”

“They’re mad,” Susan said.  “The idea of humans being created by an alien race ...”

Mason stood and poked the terminal.  “The concept of creator gods has been around for a very long time,” he said, softly.  “We used to believe in gods that were bigger and nastier humans.  Some think those humanoid gods were actually eldritch creatures who were shaped into something more palatable by the force of our belief.  Later, we came up with the idea of a single all-powerful creator god, surrounded by a host of angels and threatened by devils.  When we came up with the concept of aliens, the idea of aliens watching over us – or threatening us – was easily worked into the myths.  There were quite a few stories of aliens kidnapping humans over the years.  They faded and died shortly after we started exploring the solar system.”

Susan gave him an odd look.  “And your point?”

“My point is that everyone wants to believe in something watching out for them, even if it is Grandfather God looking down from on high or a benevolent alien race keeping an eye on us from a safe distance,” Mason said.  “And now we’ve discovered the spheres, it is clear that at least one alien race did keep an eye on us.”

The terminal came to life.  Mason switched channels quickly until he found a news program and turned up the volume.  “... Protesters clashed in New York today, between groups that believed the Dyson System should be left completely alone and their rivals, who want to be transported to the sphere to join their comrades in safety.  The Mayor has made an official statement warning that rioting will not be tolerated; the National Guard is reportedly mobilising to clear the streets.  Similar protests were reported in London, Paris, Berlin and ...”

“Charming,” Susan said.  “And what do we do about it?”

“I doubt we can do anything about it,” Mason said.  “It’s something deep within the human mind.  All we can do is try to cope.”

“I see,” Susan said.  “And what if they’re just super-advanced aliens?”

She scowled as the images shifted, showing protesters clashing with counter-protestors and then being overwhelmed by the police.  “If the Builders saw that, what do you think they’d think?”

Mason shrugged.  “The Tadpoles don’t understand our politics, any more than we understand theirs,” he said.  “The Builders might not understand what’s happening either.”

“At a speech today, Professor Justice Billycock insisted the human race must prepare itself for meeting a far more advanced species,” the TV presenter continued.  “He stated we must attempt to fix our problems, rather than exporting them into space and infecting the rest of a pristine galaxy.  The speech ...”

“Turn it off,” Susan said.  She sat back in her chair and finished her tea.  It was bad enough being lectured by her fellow officers, but at least they knew what they were talking about.  Academics, in her experience, knew little about the real world and cared less ... and then acted all surprised when their grand plans ran into reality and shattered.  “The Builders are advanced, true, and somehow their technology is still active even if they’re no longer with us.  But they are not gods.  The gap is not insurmountable.”

“The Vesy might disagree,” Mason said, dryly.

“They could match us, given time,” Susan objected.

“They don’t have time,” Mason said.  “It took us ... what ...?  Three hundred thousand years to climb from the earliest days of the human race to the stars?  If that ... there’s a lot we don’t know about what happened that long ago, or how things really were back then.  Even if we count from the birth of Jesus, it still took over two thousand years to reach the stars.  The Vesy won’t have much of their culture left by the time they join us ...”

He scowled.  “And what’ll happen to us if we meet a race so far advanced their tech might as well be magic?”

His eyes narrowed.  “There was a comic book I read once, when I was ill.  Very ill.  It was very silly.  King John and his baddies were facing an alien invasion, or so they thought.  They came up with a bunch of truly silly ideas to fight the aliens, from nets carried by pigeons to ... even sillier ideas.  None of them would have worked for a moment, if the aliens had been anything other than a figment of their imagination.”

Susan raised her eyebrows.  “And how old were you when you read this book?”

“My point is, the king in the book couldn’t even begin to comprehend what he was facing,” Mason said.  “The most advanced piece of technology in his world was a crossbow.  He knew nothing about steam power, let alone atoms and nuclear power and ... I don’t even think he knew the Earth was a sphere.  He might not have.”

“They knew the Earth was a globe far earlier than we think,” Susan pointed out.  “The king might well have known the truth.”

“It would have been played for humour,” Mason said.  “Point is, the Builders know things we can imagine without truly understanding how to turn them into reality.  But what are we missing?  What do they know that we can’t even imagine?  I can’t imagine!”

Susan had to laugh.  “We will catch up with them,” she said.  “One day.”

“Yeah,” Mason agreed.  “And what will they do if they think we’re catching up?”

He made a face.  “They took humans from Earth, years ago.  Why?  They then put those humans on a sphere specifically designed to forestall the development of anything more advanced than bows and arrows.  The poor bastards have very few ways to advance and almost all of them require a mindset they lack, a mindset they have been deliberately prevented from developing.  I don’t know if the sphere truly is a zoo, but ... what would we do if a lion escaped from the zoo and started prowling the streets?”

“We’d hunt the beast down, and quickly,” Susan said.  “Are you saying you think they might be hostile?”

“The lion would think we were,” Mason said.  “One moment, he’s strolling down the street; the next, some bastard shoots him in the rump with a tranquilliser dart and he wakes up in the zoo, wondering what happened to him.  The poor beast doesn’t understand modern society – in fact, he might not even realise he was in a zoo until he broke out.  There are horror stories about that, you know.  They’re required reading in Alpha Black.”

“I think I’m going to audit your department,” Susan teased.  “Do you spend all your time reading?”

“No.”  Mason grinned.  “We watch old-timey television too, sometimes.”

“I’m definitely going to audit you,” Susan said.  “What’s your point?”

Mason met her eyes.  “We know nothing about the Builders.  Their tech is so advanced we can barely comprehend half of it and we cannot hope to duplicate it.  They may think we’re nothing more than zoo animals.  They may even have assumed we’d blow ourselves up, or the virus would have overwhelmed us, or something – anything – other than climbing the ladder into space.  The odds might even be on their side, too.  It took us a long time to get into space and there were a lot of false starts.  They might have assumed the humans they took and preserved would be the only survivors and be surprised to discover they were wrong.”

He scowled.  “And what will they do if they find out we’re poking around the spheres?”

Susan looked back at him.  “One of their spheres died,” she said.  She didn’t want to think about the uncounted millions who might have perished with the sphere.  “They are powerful, but they are not gods.  They may not even be around any longer.”

“Perhaps,” Mason said.  “It would be wiser to leave the spheres alone, wouldn’t it?”

“Wiser?”  Susan shook her head.  “It doesn’t matter.  Ships will be going to the spheres, whether we like it or not.  All we can do is try to keep control of the process ... and ensure that everything discovered is shared, before someone tries to do something stupid.”

“Like summoning the Builders,” Mason said.  “Or ... who knows?”

“That’s the problem,” Susan said.  “No one knows.”

Chapter Two: London, United Kingdom

The fantasy snapped out of existence, as if it had never been there at all.

It hadn’t, of course.  Captain Staci Templeton knew it had been about as real as Santa Claus, the Tooth Fairy and the mysterious black starships that were only ever spotted by half-drunk asteroid miners who forgot to take a recording before the ships vanished again.  It was still disorienting.  The real world seemed to shiver around her, grim and disappointing compared to the fantasy she’d embraced so deeply she could almost believe it was real.  She took a deep shuddering breath, reaching for the water bottle and drinking deeply.  It always took time to centre herself after terminating the fantasy. 

She closed her eyes for a long moment, gathering her thoughts.  The cubicle was tiny, little more than a simple room with a VR set and a simple comfortable chair.  The air was fresh and clean, faint traces of something within the atmosphere helping to galvanise her thoughts.  The operators probably wanted her gone – and quickly, so they could offer their services to someone else.  It was technically illegal to kick someone out, at least before they’d reminded themselves of the difference between reality and fantasy, but hurrying clients out the door wasn’t quite the same.  Quite.  Staci snorted to herself as she opened her eyes and stood on wobbly legs.  She’d paid enough, in her estimation, for years in the fantasy world.

No, she told herself.  That would be the end of everything.

The thought haunted her as she donned her jacket and keyed the console, purging the records before heading for the door.  The VR parlours were supposed to be private, with no public records of who used them or what fantasies they embraced, but she wasn’t that trusting.  She’d been a minor celebrity well before she’d stumbled across the Dyson Spheres and she doubted the media would hesitate to offer huge bribes, just for a record of where she’d gone and what she’d done.  Some egghead with more degrees than common sense would probably use the information to write articles questioning her fitness for command, pointing out the dangers of VR addiction.  Idiots.  She’d come to the parlour because it provided a chance to escape the modern world, at least for a few short moments that felt like hours.

She put the thought aside as she stepped through the door and into the corridor.  It was as drab and grey as the cubicle, the other doors closed and presumably locked.  She’d been cautioned to pay no attention to other clients, if she saw them.  She’d only seen one, a sad little man who’d kept his eyes firmly on the ground.  She wondered, idly, what worlds he was embracing now.  The parlour offered more than just fantasies of adventure in worlds of magic, or romance, or starships right out of science-fantasy.  There were some of happily married lives ... she suspected, deep inside, they weren’t healthy.  The dreams weren’t real and could never be.

The locker bleeped as she pressed her hand against the scanner, allowing it to read the chip embedded under her skin.  She pulled it open and removed her terminal and wristcom, strapping the latter to her wrist.  A message was already blinking, reminding her that she had an appointment in the Admiralty in an hour.  She sighed, checked her appearance in the mirror, then turned and walked into the lobby.  The receptionist studiously ignored her.  She was paid very well not to notice anything, even one of the most famous faces in the world.  It was a relief.  Staci’s former CO had loved the limelight, but she hated it.  It didn’t help that half the tabloids had declared her the most eligible bachelorette in the world and ran long articles about who she was going to marry, from aristocrats she’d never met to famous people she’d never heard of.  She supposed it beat being called a career woman or a spinster, but still ...

She tapped her wristcom, hailing a taxi.  The cab materialised within seconds.  They weren’t permitted to wait on the parlour’s grounds, but from what she’d heard they tended to wait just outside.  Clients weren’t meant to drive themselves and they tended to tip well.  Staci clambered inside, spoke briefly to the driver, and sat down as the cab drove through the gates and out onto the streets.  The real world looked drab and dull, compared to the fantasy.  She reminded herself, sharply, that London had always been dull and grey.

It could be worse, she thought.  London did have a certain elegance, in places.  The wars had done a considerable amount of damage, some of which had yet to be repaired, but the city centre was still striking.  It was just a shame they’d had to set up blocks upon blocks of temporary prefabricated housing.  It was the sort of temporary measure that tended to become permanent.  I could be trapped in the slums.

She put the thought aside and keyed her terminal.  Thousands of messages, almost all spam or requests for interviews, the latter worse than spam.  She snorted as she scrolled through the list, making sure the spam filter hadn’t accidentally trapped something important, then deleted them all with a certain vengeful pleasure.  The Admiralty’s PR department had been nagging her to do more interviews, but she’d taken advantage of her momentary celebrity to turn them down as much as she could.  Going back to school long enough to tell the students they needed to work hard to join the navy was one thing; talking to reporters who would twist everything she said to suit their agendas was quite another.  She didn’t know why they bothered to interview people first before making shit up.  The nonsense they’d written about her former CO ...  It was nothing more than a waste of time.

The cab slowed as it neared the centre of town.  Staci scowled as she saw the protest marches – some demanding an immediate return to the Dyson Spheres, some insisting the alien superstructure should be left well alone – and the policemen escorting them.  The police had cautioned her to stay well clear of both sets of protesters, pointing out that one group saw her as a hero and the other as a villain.  She hadn’t been sure which was which and, judging by the weirder news reports, neither were they.  It was strange.  Some thought the Builders were gods, who’d saved humanity from itself; others, perhaps with more reason, thought the Builders were kidnappers who needed to be stopped.  Staci suspected neither side truly understood what they were saying – or demanding.  It was impossible to grasp the sheer scale of the Dyson Spheres unless you saw them with the naked eye.

“Lots of madmen out there,” the driver commented.  “They think the world is going to end.”

“And the gods are going to come back to rescue the elect before the world dies in fire,” Staci added.  She’d watched a religious scholar insist that Noah’s Ark was actually a racial memory of the Builders taking humans from their homeworld and seeding them on the Dyson Spheres.  His peers had immediately denounced his words as blasphemy.  “They just don’t know who the elect is, not now.”

She snorted at the thought as the cab picked its way through the crowd and paused in front of the checkpoint outside Whitehall.  The MPs spoke briefly to the driver, checked Staci’s ID and then waved the cab through the security barriers.  Staci allowed herself a moment of relief.  Mobs could get very nasty, even if one was armed.  She was entitled to carry a pistol, as a commanding officer, but she hadn’t bothered to bring it with her.  Perhaps that had been a mistake.  The government claimed they’d wiped out the last lingering pockets of viral infection – and regular blood checks were supposed to ensure the remnants of the virus never built up another foothold on Earth – but Staci didn’t believe it.  The virus was just too well adapted to be wiped out so easily.  The moment humanity turned its back, the virus would strike.  There were already demands for the security edifice to be dismantled as soon as possible.  It was a clear and growing threat to civil liberties.

So is the virus, Staci thought, as the cab pulled to a stop in front of the Admiralty.  The guards showed no reaction, but she could feel them bracing themselves.  If it had won the war, that would have been the end.

She paid the driver, careful to add a tip in cash, and stepped out of the cab.  The guards checked her ID, then waved her into the building.  A junior officer appeared as soon as she stepped into the lobby, giving the impression of bowing and scraping even though all he did was salute, and escorted her to the First Space Lord’s office.  Staci wasn’t entirely pleased to note the checkpoints had been dismantled.  They should have checked her blood, just to be sure she wasn’t infected.  She thought she wasn’t, but who knew?  No one could be sure.  The virus was insidious.

“The First Space Lord will see you shortly,” her escort said, showing her into a waiting room.  “Would you like tea or coffee?”

“Tea, please,” Staci said.

She leaned back in her chair and studied the walls.  They were lined with paintings of naval vessels, from wet-navy sailing ships to giant spacefaring supercarriers and battleships.  It seemed oddly fitting to have Lord Nelson’s Victory placed next to Admiral Smith’s Ark Royal, even though the gulf between them was so vast it was difficult to imagine how it could be surmounted.  Lord Nelson had been a great hero in his time and, in truth, Staci suspected he’d have been a naval star in almost any time.  Admiral Smith had been a little more controversial, yet without him the First Interstellar War would have been lost very quickly.  She let her eyes wander from picture to picture, drawing strength from the paintings.  The Royal Navy wasn’t just an institution.  It was a tradition.

It takes three years to build a ship, she thought, recalling Admiral Cunningham’s dictum.  He was another naval star who’d do well in the modern world.  And centuries to build a tradition.

Her escort cleared his throat.  “Captain, the First Space Lord will see you now.”

Staci’s lips twitched – he hadn’t brought her any tea – as she was shown into the office.  The First Space Lord had two offices, from what she’d been told; a fancy chamber that had been passed down from admiral to admiral and a second inner chamber she could decorate as she pleased.  Admiral Lady Susan Onarina was surprisingly minimalistic, Staci noted, as she saluted the woman behind the desk.  Her office could have easily passed for a businessman’s suite, in one of the corporate towers only a few short miles down the river.  The only hint of whimsy – or military tradition – was a single painting hanging behind her desk, a dark-skinned man in army garb.  Staci wondered, idly, if it was a subtle poke at military tradition.  Surely, a naval officer would have been more suited ...

She put the thought out of her head.  “Admiral.  It’s good to see you again.”

“Captain,” Admiral Onarina said.  “Please, take a seat.”

Staci sat.  Her escort poured tea for them both, then withdrew.  That was probably a good sign.  It was traditional for senior officers to provide tea, to put juniors at ease, and a very bad sign indeed when tea wasn’t provided.  She took a sip, then forced herself to sit back in her chair.  Admiral Onarina was a heroine, at least to Staci, but she was still a flag officer.  She’d come to the point in due time.

“Captain,” Admiral Onarina said.  “I trust you enjoyed your shore leave?”

“It was interesting,” Staci said.  “And nearly everywhere I went was infested with reporters.”

The admiral’s lips twitched.  “I’m afraid it’s part of the job,” she said.  “But it could be worse.  They could be adoring brainless celebrities instead.”

Staci shrugged.  She’d heard, once, that reporters had become convinced that the opinions of sports stars and celebrities were actually important.  Perhaps they had been in their own field – Staci would happily accept the opinion of a famous footballer on football – but the idea they had anything important to say about anything outside their competence was just absurd.  One might as well demand the opinions of young children or senior citizens so old they could still remember the days humanity thought it was alone in the universe.  There’d even been a theory that the Troubles owed much to celebrities who pushed popular causes without bothering to think about the long-term implications.  Personally, she thought it was silly.  The British Government had never needed celebrities to screw up spectacularly.  It could do a perfectly good job of that on its own.

The Admiral sipped her tea.  “It was not easy coming to any sort of consensus.  The unity forced upon us by the war is fracturing.  Certain parties want to keep pushing towards Amalgamation.  Others think we no longer need unity.  There’s no single authority with both the remit and the ability to handle everything, which means the last month has been largely consumed with achingly polite diplomatic arguments.”

Staci frowned.  “The Chinese aren’t happy?”

“No one is happy,” Admiral Onarina said.  “But we have hammered out a rough agreement.”

She met Staci’s eyes.  “You’re going back to Dyson.”

Staci sucked in her breath.  It had crossed her mind, more than once, that the government might turn her into a scapegoat, even though the decision to bend – if not break – the Solar Treaty had been made at the very highest levels.  Hell, the fact she was a celebrity might have - perversely – made it an easier decision.  She could be given a formal slap on the wrist and sent into de facto exile, her celebrity serving as an excuse not to punish her further.  Even if she was spared punishment for a crime she hadn’t committed, there was no guarantee she’d be allowed to return to Dyson.  Endeavour was a survey ship.  She might be sent deeper into unexplored space.

“Thank you, Admiral,” she managed, finally.  It was exciting and terrifying at the same time.  She understood space combat, even when the odds were stacked against her.  The Dyson Spheres were dangerously unpredictable.  She still had nightmares about the alien energy weapons slicing though her hull like a hot knife through butter.  “Are we going alone?”

“No,” Admiral Onarina said.

Staci felt her heart sink.  Bad news was coming.  She could tell.

“We’re putting together a small flotilla of research and survey ships, escorted by a squadron of smaller vessels.  I’d prefer something heavier, but the general consensus is that we shouldn’t risk provoking the Builders by flying battleships and supercarriers into their system.  Admiral Dismukes will be in command, flying his flag on Endeavour.  I’m sorry.”

“Pardon?”  Staci had never heard of Admiral Dismukes.  “Admiral Dismukes?”

“He’s American, not British,” Admiral Onarina explained.  “For diplomatic reasons, he and his staff will be based on Endeavour rather than an American ship.  There may be issues involved, as I’m sure you can guess, but ... I expect you to cope.”

Staci frowned.  “Admiral, with all due respect, Endeavour is not set up to serve as a command vessel.”

“I believe the general theory is that you won’t need to serve in such a role,” Admiral Onarina said.  She didn’t sound as though she believed what she was saying.  “The admiral certainly won’t have a proper battle squadron under his command.  If you do run into trouble, anything you can’t handle, you have orders to retreat and let the diplomats sort it out.”

“I see,” Staci said, slowly.  “Are we expecting trouble?”

“There are two major problems,” Admiral Onarina said.  “First, our alien allies have yet to commit themselves to joining the MNF.  Our assumption is that they will, but we don’t know for sure.  They may deploy their own missions or try to keep us from investigating.  A secondary problem is that a number of earthly powers have already dispatched ships to Dyson.  They may cause trouble for you.”

She paused.  “And we know very little about what might be lurking on the other side of the Dyson Spheres.  For all we know, the Builders might take a hand.”

Staci shivered.  The sphere’s automated defences had come far too close to destroying her ship.  “If they do ...?”

“If they do, we have to hope and pray the diplomats can talk to them,” Admiral Onarina told her.  “We cannot even begin to draw up contingency plans if they turn hostile.  There’s no way to know what they can do, save in the most general terms, and those are utterly terrifying.  They could crush our worlds and turn them into asteroid fields – or black holes.  If worse comes to worst, you are to withdraw and hope for the best.  No heroics.”

“Shit,” Staci said, softly.  She’d known there was a prospect of having to withdraw under fire – it was quite possible an alien race would note Endeavour sneaking around their system and ambush her – but the Dyson Spheres were just too big to escape easily.  “Is it wise to return?”

“Wise or not, it is going to happen,” Admiral Onarina said, bluntly.  “Ideally, the whole story would have been buried long enough to let us decide what to do.  But we don’t live in an ideal world.  We have to get there and quickly, with enough force to keep outsiders from poking the hive until we know for sure what’s inside.”

“They’ll insist we have no jurisdiction,” Staci said.  “We don’t own the system.”

“No,” Admiral Onarina agreed.  “But we – all the major powers – have agreed to assert authority over it, at least in the absence of the Builders.  It’ll hold, we hope.”

We hope, Staci thought.

Admiral Onarina leaned forward.  “And with that in mind, there are some contingency plans we need to discuss.”

Chapter Three: London, United Kingdom

“I must say, you have done well for yourself,” Felicity Grabber said, as she sipped from an elegant glass of expensive wine.  “It is so good to see you again.”

Ambassador Lady Charlotte Hammond gritted her teeth and pasted a polite smile onto her face.  There was absolutely nothing real about Felicity, from her perfect smile to her perfect body, the result of extensive genetic engineering and cosmetic surgery.  Her long blonde hair fell over naked shoulders and an elegant dress that revealed her curves without showing anything below the shoulder.  She looked nineteen.  It was difficult to believe she was older than Charlotte herself, with two adult children and a third on the verge of graduation.  And it said something about Felicity, Charlotte had always thought, that she’d hired surrogates to bear them rather than carry them to term herself or use an exowomb.  They’d never been friends.

“It’s been an interesting few weeks,” she said.  She almost wished she were back on the sphere, trapped on the surface.  “So many people have been so keen to make my acquaintance.”

“You know what it’s like, Darling,” Felicity said.  “No one quite knows what to make of you.”

Charlotte sighed inwardly.  She’d once been a respected aristocratic lady – and yet she’d yearned for something more.  It hadn’t been fair.  She’d spent her early adulthood raising the children and running her husband’s estate and she’d wanted something for herself and ... and so she’d stumbled into bed with a war hero.  She knew herself well enough to admit she’d been looking for political advantage, as well as a lover, but ... she’d come to like him for himself before her husband had discovered the affair.  The bastard wouldn’t have given a damn, she thought, if it hadn’t been so public.  High Society liked to pretend everything was just perfect, no matter the truth.  It turned blind eyes to tears and bruises and ...

She sighed, again.  She’d had hopes and dreams of building a political career for her lover, Mitch.  But he’d died, leaving her alone.  The Powers That Be had thought she was done.  They’d sent her into de facto exile on Endeavour in hopes she’d take the hint and never come home – or, at least, that she’d be forgotten by the time she finally returned to Earth.  And then ... her lips twitched, despite herself.  She’d done well for herself.  She’d discovered the Dyson Spheres!

More accurately, I was on the ship that discovered them, Charlotte thought.  And they can’t get rid of me now.

She felt her smile widen as her eyes swept the room.  There were dozens of men and women, the great and the good, the very flower of nobility ... and none of them, absolutely none, knew how to treat her.  Should they shun her, as the woman who’d lacked the sense to keep her affair out of the public eye?  Or should they bow and scrape to her, as the woman who’d been tossed into a dung heap and come out clutching diamonds and rubies?  The thought amused her.  They’d given her the post as a way of getting rid of her and, now, they couldn’t take it away.  Not easily. 

“It’s been a long time,” Felicity said.  “Do you know who’s in and who’s out?”

She babbled on, detailing the lives and times of the aristocracy.  Charlotte tried not to look too bored.  Two years ago, she would have lapped up every last detail, from the hints Lord Lomond’s daughter was dating a commoner with rare potential to the rumours about Lady Wellstone’s last will and testament, but now it was just boring.  She’d been on a shuttle that had been shot out of the sky and crash-landed on a Dyson Sphere, then forced to march for days before reaching safety ... she looked at the young men and wondered how many of them had done anything so dangerous.  They were meant to win their spurs – her former husband had put his naval career ahead of everything, including his wife and children – but she doubted they’d spent much time in uniform.  They just didn’t have the air.

“And Lord Drummond’s brat was caught looking up Lady Caria’s dress,” Felicity finished.  “It was quite a scandal.”

“I’m sure it was,” Charlotte said.  The gossips would be gossiping for years, long after everyone involved had put it behind them.  “Silly little bitch.”

Felicity eyed her, disapprovingly.  “Some girls need the firm hand of a mother to keep them in line.”

Charlotte felt her temper flare.  She hadn’t asked to have minimal contact with her daughters ... she gritted her teeth, keeping her emotions under tight control.  Her daughters had sided with their father and ... she’d sent messages and they’d exchanged brief and achingly polite conversations, but it hadn’t been the same.  It hurt, to think of all the time she’d spent with them while their father had been on deployment ... she felt tears prickling in her eyes and hastily blinked them away.  She hadn’t done them any favours when she’d sent them to school.  They’d been mocked and bullied for being her kids from the moment the news broke.

She raised her eyes, looking around the room again.  They were ... peacocks.  Nothing more than peacocks.  Men and women strutting around, showing off their expensive garb and even more expensive cosmetic adjustments, pretending they were important.  They wouldn’t have needed to pretend if they actually were, no matter if they could trace their bloodline all the way back to William the Conqueror or Henry II or even Edward the Confessor.  The real work was done by aristocrats like her former husband or the PM or ...

“Charlotte?”  Felicity sounded amused, rather than concerned.  “Are you listening to me?”

“No,” Charlotte said.  She was vaguely aware Felicity had been talking, but she couldn’t remember a single word.  “Tell me, do you really think that constantly rejuvenating your looks will keep your husband from straying?”

Felicity gaped.  She couldn’t have looked more shocked if Charlotte had drawn back her hand and slapped her.  “Well, I never ...”

“Think?”  Charlotte was no longer in any mood for games.  “No.  Probably not.”

She turned and strode away, heading for the balcony.  It had been closed and shuttered, the last time she’d visited the hall, but now it was open, letting the guests stand in the warm summer air and stare at the lights of London.  The estate was small, compared to the one she’d thrown away, yet it was close enough to the city for the land to be worth billions ... or it had, before the war.  Now ... she wasn’t so sure.  The city could easily have turned into a death trap if the virus had gotten loose.  Perhaps it was worth seeing how far property prices had fallen ... no.  It wasn’t worth the effort.  She didn’t have the money to purchase a house anywhere within fifty miles of the city.

Her heart sank.  Felicity would be telling everyone who mattered how rude Charlotte had been and then ... somehow, Charlotte found it hard to care.  It wasn’t her world any longer.  It was just ... she shook her head, half-wishing she’d had the insight before her lover had met his end.  It might have changed things, for better or worse ...

A servant materialised behind her, a young man wearing a perfectly tailored suit.  “My Lady,” he said.  “His Lordship would like to see you in the Green Room.”

Probably to kick me out personally, Charlotte thought.  Nothing spread faster than dreadful rumours.  Felicity had probably started spreading the story the moment Charlotte had left her behind.  And then ...

She shrugged, dismissing the concerns.  “I’m coming,” she told the boy.  He really was a boy, to her.  She wondered if he was old enough to vote.  “Lead the way.”

The servant turned and led her through a half-concealed door, then down a long corridor that was surprisingly empty – and bare.  A servant passageway, she guessed, and wondered if leading her down the passage was a subtle insult.  She was no servant ... she frowned inwardly as she realised it would also keep her out of sight, ensuring the general public didn’t know she was walking though the walls.  It felt odd, suddenly, to realise just how many meetings she’d arranged, back when she’d been the Lady of Hammond Hall.  She almost missed it ...

No, she told herself, firmly.  That part of your life is over.

She calmed herself with an effort.  She was no longer the purebred lady who’d married into great wealth and power.  She was someone who had built a life for herself.  It might not be the best life, and she had to count her pennies very carefully, but it was hers.  It could be worse.  She’d heard horror stories about far too many lords and ladies who lived lives of quiet desperation – if they were lucky.  It really could be a great deal worse.

The servant opened the door, then stepped aside.  Charlotte walked in and blinked in surprise as she saw the man on the far side of the room.  The Prime Minister ... funny, she’d never thought he’d attend one of these parties.  He was genuinely important, which was more than could be said for most of the guests.  But then, she knew from her old life just how much business was conducted in private rooms while the rest of the guests ate, drank and danced the night away.  The PM’s presence shouldn’t really have been a surprise.

“Lady Charlotte,” the PM said, standing.  He took the hand she extended and kissed the air just above her skin.  “It’s good to see you again.”

“Thank you,” Charlotte said.  She was almost sure the PM was lying.  The grand plan to send her into exile had failed spectacularly, leaving her with enough celebrity to make removing her a very difficult task.  “What can I do for you?”

The PM looked oddly relieved to get straight down to business.  Charlotte wondered just how many others he intended to meet, before the party finally came to an end.  There were quite a few possible candidates, including several who were technically on the other side of the House and therefore couldn’t be invited to Ten Downing Street without the media asking pointed questions.  She suspected the PM’s position was actually weaker than it looked.  It was fairly common for a war-winning PM to be voted out of office at the next election – or earlier, if the backbenchers felt he needed to be removed before they fought and lost the election itself. 

“We’re putting together a multinational force to return to Dyson,” the PM said shortly, as if Charlotte hadn’t already heard the news.  Perhaps he thought she hadn’t.  She’d lost touch with most of her sources and hadn’t had the time to replace them.  The few that had remained, however, had been enough to keep her informed.  “You’ll be returning as Ambassador, although you will have a staff – as before – and we don’t know who you’ll be talking to.”

Charlotte nodded, curtly.  She’d expected as much.  She could have turned down the mission, if she’d wished, but it would have cost her everything.  Not that she would have tried, even if she’d thought it was a valid option.  The only hope of building up a new career for herself lay in going back to the spheres and ... and what?  Making contact with human settlements that had been isolated for years?  Meeting the Builders themselves?  She wondered, suddenly, just how many of the scenarios she’d seen came close to reality.

A super-advanced entity should be capable of empathizing with ants, she thought numbly.  We can empathise with them.  But that doesn’t stop us putting down poison when the ants get too annoying.

“You will also have a certain responsibility for smoothing over clashes between different nationalities,” the PM continued.  “So far, nine different nations have agreed to contribute warships to the MNF.  There may be others – or others sending their own ships.  It will be an extremely complex diplomatic environment, so learn to rely on your staff.”

Charlotte smiled.  “You mean, let them do most of the work.”

“It serves a useful purpose,” the PM said.  “If a junior official makes a mistake, his seniors can override him.  If the seniors make a mistake, it could plunge the country into war.”

“Charming,” Charlotte said.  She knew what he wasn’t saying.  If she screwed up, she’d be disowned and thrown to the wolves.  Or the media ... on the whole, she’d prefer the wolves.  “Will I be in overall command?”

“No,” the PM said.  “Admiral Dismukes – an American – will serve as mission commander.  You’ll be the senior diplomat.  Ideally, the military officers will be able to resolve everything without your assistance, but ...”

“They know what is at stake,” Charlotte said.  In her experience, military officers tended to be realists.  They knew better than to let themselves get distracted with flights of fancy.  “And they can work out the details as they go along.”

“Quite,” the PM said.  “You’ll get your formal briefing tomorrow – and the chance to request specific personnel, if you wish them – before departure.  Ideally, you’ll be leaving for Endeavour three days from now, although that may slip.  You’ll have your chance to meet with the monarch prior to departure, to receive his blessing.”

Charlotte raised her eyebrows.  It was customary for senior ambassadors to meet with the king before they left, although that courtesy had been denied to her when she’d left for Endeavour the first time.  She wondered if it was a sign her star was rising again or, more likely, a grim awareness the human race would be wise to avoid alienating the Builders ... if they showed themselves.  Charlotte had heard all the debates – the Builders were dead and gone, the Builders were watching from a safe distance – and she was firmly agnostic on the question.  There was just no way to be sure.

They didn’t intervene when their automated defences blew us out of the sky, she thought, coldly.  But given the sheer size of the Dyson Sphere, they might not have noticed.  It would be like us trying to spot a shuttle crash on Mars.

“I look forward to it,” she said, finally.  “Do you think anyone would mind if I left the party early?”

“Probably not,” the PM said.  They shared a smile.  “Personally, I’d advise you to get an early night.  Tomorrow is going to be very busy.”

Charlotte nodded.  Military and diplomatic briefers tended to either hand out infodump after infodump, which was difficult to follow, or dumb complicated matters down to the point they became worryingly simplistic.  It was easy to suspect they were slanted to push the decision-makers into making a particular decision, the one their briefers wanted them to make.  She sighed inwardly as she stood, silently congratulating herself for reading around the topics as much as possible.  If she was any judge, knowing more about the context would ensure it was harder for her to be manipulated by someone who thought she was painfully ignorant. 

And we’ll be months in transit unless the navy invented a whole new FTL drive, she thought, wryly.  There’ll be plenty of time to read everything in the datacores.

The thought bothered her.  She wasn’t an expert in naval technology, but she knew enough to be aware of just how wide the gulf between the Royal Navy and the Builders truly was.  The simple fact they’d built a working Dyson Sphere with a curved gravity field stood in mute testament to their technological skill.  She shuddered to think what would happen if the gravity field failed.  The sphere’s surface had felt just like a regular planet, but if the gravity vanished ... she didn’t want to think about it.  The entire population might die and ... she didn’t even know how many people lived on the sphere.  She’d seen the estimates.  Some of them were almost impossibly high.

“Good luck,” the PM said.  “I’ll see you before you depart.”

Charlotte nodded, then left the room and made her way back down to the dance floor.  It felt ... darker somehow, although the lighting hadn’t dimmed.  She stared for a long moment, drinking in the scene as young men and women moved across the floor, then turned away and headed down to the door.  The staff would bring the car around as soon as they saw her. 

“You don’t have to leave so soon,” a voice said.  “You can stay.”

Charlotte turned to see someone she vaguely remembered.  She normally had a good memory for names and faces, but this one ... she couldn’t place him.  Nor did she have time to poke at her memories and recall where she’d seen him.  He was too young – she would put him at eighteen and that was being generous – to have made an impression.  Even if he’d inherited while young, he’d have a guardian looking after his interests until he reached his majority.

“Lucy misses you,” the young man said.  “Will you call her?”

“Lucille,” Charlotte corrected, coldly.  Now she remembered him ... a young man who’d invited her daughter to a ball.  She couldn’t recall what had happened, but clearly the two had stayed in touch.  “It’s none of your business.”

“She’s your daughter,” he said.  There was an odd insistence in his voice that irked her.  “Call Lucy.  Before it’s too late.”

Charlotte swallowed the angry response that came to mind.  It was none of his business.

“I will,” she said, unsure if she was promising him or herself.  She owed it to her daughters to call them before she left, or go see them if they were willing.  “But right now I have other things to do.”

And, with that, she headed down the steps to the car.

Chapter Four: HMS Endeavour, Sol System

“We are now making our final approach to HMS Endeavour,” the pilot said, over the intercom.  “Please place all your tray tables in locked position, stop flirting with the stewardess and prepare to disembark through the airlock.  If you’re very lucky, it might even be connected to the ship.”

Staci snorted.  Pilot humour was basic, at best.  She didn’t blame them.  Military shuttle pilots might find themselves on routine supply runs one day and flying straight into enemy fire the next.  Thanks to the virus, the gap between military and civilian life had thinned to the point a situation could go from peaceful to screaming terror in the blink of an eye.  The world was supposed to be returning to normal now, but it would be a long time before the last caches of the alien virus were eradicated or rendered harmless.  They dared not drop their guard.

And it’s only a matter of time before someone starts experimenting with the virus, trying to turn it into a bioweapon, she thought.  It might have started life as a bioweapon.

The shuttle shook once, the gravity field flickering slightly as it matched and merged with Endeavour’s.  Staci took a long breath as the engine hum faded away, then stood and made her way to the airlock.  There weren’t many crewmen heading back to Endeavour – her crew had been recalled two days ago, once the new mission orders had been cut – and the handful who were stood aside to allow her to pass.  Staci braced herself as she stepped through the airlock, sensing the familiarity in the air.  Endeavour was her ship.  An armed marine stepped forward, pressed a bioscanner against her arm, then saluted and waved her through the checkpoint.  Staci returned the salute, then saluted the colours.  It felt as if she’d come home.

“Captain,” Commander Mike Jenner said.  Her XO was standing just past the airlock, waiting.  “Welcome aboard.”

“Thank you,” Staci said.  She felt a twinge of guilt.  Jenner had had his shore leave, while she’d been enduring endless debriefing sessions, but he’d still had to return to the ship early to supervise the refit.  “I trust everything went well?”

“Well enough,” Jenner assured her.  He fell into step beside her as she headed to her ready room.  “Certainly, nothing happened to delay our departure.”

Staci nodded, allowing herself a moment of relief.  She liked being captain of her ship, mistress under God, and being so close to the Admiralty meant she could be overruled at any moment.  Her orders could be changed, her crew could be reassigned ... it wasn’t as chaotic as it had been during the war, with the navy struggling to patch up leaks while fighting engagements on multiple fronts, but it was still a nightmare.  She wouldn’t feel totally secure in the men and machines under her command until they were on their way, leaving the Admiralty far behind.  For all she knew, half her crew would be recalled and assigned to a new ship before she left.

But this mission is important, she told herself.  They’re not going to make changes now.

She put the thought aside as she led the way into her ready room and looked around.  It hadn’t changed much, save for the sofa being converted into a bed and a small dresser placed beside it.  Her lips twitched in wry amusement.  She’d spent most of her career on small ships and had few qualms about converting her ready room into a makeshift cabin, even though it was smaller than a lieutenant’s quarters.  Her old cabin had been assigned to the admiral ... she wondered, idly, if he’d bitch and moan about having to sleep in such confined chambers.  She could name a dozen commanding officers – and admirals – who’d spent their careers on battleships and carriers and would be horrified if their quarters were anything less than palatial ...

Too bad, she thought.  If they wanted bigger quarters, they should have assigned a passenger liner to the fleet.

“I’ve been using the ready room as an office,” Jenner said, indicating the desk.  It was covered in datapads, terminals, and a pair of coffee mugs.  “I’ll have everything moved out shortly.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Staci said.  Her XO hadn’t had much choice.  “We probably won’t have a good opportunity to sort things out until we’re underway.”

Jenner nodded.  “Coffee?”

“Please,” Staci said.  She’d spent most of the morning being briefed on everything from joint operational planning to the weird and wonderful theories about the spheres put forward by commenters who appeared to be a strange mix of reasonable scientists and cranks.  It was hard to escape the impression no one really knew what they were talking about – and, perhaps more importantly, that none of them had read the briefing papers.  “Milk, no sugar.”

“Aye, Captain,” Jenner said.  “How was your leave?”

Staci shrugged.  “It was fine,” she said.  “But I had to stay in London.  It was ... unfortunate.”

“The city isn’t what it used to be,” Jenner agreed.  He passed her a mug of coffee, then sat in the visitor’s chair.  “Did you at least get a chance to check out the sights?”

“Not really.”  Staci took her seat and looked at the small mountain of datapads.  “I laid a wreath at the Cenotaph, but little else.”

She took a moment to gather herself.  “Hit me,” she said.  “What’s the bad news?”

Jenner smiled, rather humourlessly.  “We are going to be embarking a lot of passengers,” he said.  “Admiral Dismukes and his staff, Ambassador Hammond and her staff ... a few dozen scientists and researchers and even a handful of reporters, the latter of whom we need to keep sweet to ensure the navy continues to be funded ... in short, we’re going to be crammed to the gunwales.  We’ve pulled out a considerable amount of survey gear we’re unlikely to need” – he grimaced – “and replaced it with more living quarters, but we’re going to be living in each others’ pockets until we set up habitats in the Dyson System itself.”

Staci scowled.  “There’s no way to be sure we won’t need the survey gear.”

“No, Captain,” Jenner said.  “On the plus side, the squadron will include a pair of repurposed planetary survey ships.  They can take up the slack, as long as nothing goes spectacularly wrong.  I’ve drawn up contingency plans for shifting duties to the other ships, if we need them.  On paper, they should work.”

“On paper,” Staci said.  The various space navies had learnt how to work together over the past decades – the interstellar wars had left them with no choice – but there were always disagreements that could easily turn into friction, or a shooting war, if the diplomats didn’t manage to paper over the cracks in time.  “In practice?”

“We’ll have to put them into action to find out,” Jenner said.  He didn’t sound remotely pleased.  “My staff has prepared a series of drills for us, when we’re underway.  I imagine the admiral will have no objection to working out the kinks in our arrangements, before we actually fly into danger.  God alone knows what may be lurking within the spheres.”

Staci nodded, slowly.  Dyson Two was unimaginably huge.  It was difficult to comprehend just how many people could live on the sphere, let alone just how much land surface there was.  The first mission to the sphere had barely scratched the surface.  There could be billions upon billions of people on the sphere, entire settlements of hyper-advanced aliens that had gone completely unnoticed.  She doubted it – she agreed with the researchers who thought the sphere had been deliberately designed to limit technological growth – but she had to admit it was possible.  The Builders were powerful, yet they weren’t gods.  The ruins of Dyson One bore mute testament to their limits.

And we have no idea how many people died when the sphere came apart, she thought, numbly.  The boffins had tried to calculate the answer, only to draw a blank.  The numbers were as unimaginably huge as the sphere itself.  There are too many questions and not enough answers.

Jenner leaned forward.  “The crew has been briefed on both diplomatic and first contact protocols,” he said.  “The admiral and his staff are military personnel and I don’t anticipate any problems with them; the ambassador and the remainder of the contact and research teams are quite another story.  With your permission, I’d like to assign a handful of junior officers to serve as escorts, when they step outside their quarters.  The last thing we need is an ambassador accidentally walking through an airlock and being ejected into interplanetary space.”

“True,” Staci agreed.  Space was an incredibly harsh and unforgiving environment.  Spacers understood the risks, and did what they could to minimise them, but groundhogs needed to learn fast before they got themselves hurt or killed.  She made a mental note to insist on reviewing safety and security procedures, before something really went wrong.  A dead ambassador would look bloody awkward on the official record.  “Make sure the youngsters are properly briefed too.  I don’t want anyone taking advantage of them.”

“Got it.”  Jenner made a face.  “I’ll see to it personally.”

Staci nodded.  She hadn’t met many diplomats, but she’d heard horror stories.  “Make sure you keep a stern eye on the midshipmen,” she said.  “And that they know they can come to you with any problems.”

“It’s hard for juniors to make that call,” Jenner said.  “But I’ll do my best to make it clear.”

“Reassure them I’ll have their back,” Staci said.  Endeavour had a brig.  If a diplomat molested one of her crew, the bastard would spend the rest of the voyage in irons.  It was a pity she couldn’t put him on a strict bread and water diet ... she put that thought aside before it had time to take root.  “Otherwise, we’ll just have to hope for the best.”

She leaned back in her chair.  “Are there any other points of concern?”

Jenner met her eyes.  “We’ve installed a modified fleet control system,” he said.  “It should – on paper, again – suffice to allow the admiral to effectively command the squadron.  In practice, we don’t know.  Endeavour was never designed as a command vessel and very few of our communications and datanet links come up to current standards.  It’s impossible to be sure, Captain, but my general feeling is that the network will come apart at the seams very quickly if we find ourselves under attack.  There simply isn’t enough redundancy in the command datanet.  We can compensate for some weaknesses, but it will be all too easy for anyone to pick us out as the command ship.”

“And then mark us as the priority target,” Staci finished.  It was a simple – and effective – tactic.  Regular fleet command vessels were designed to blend in with their peers.  Endeavour was far too large to be overlooked.  “We need secondary and tertiary command networks.”

“I suspect the remainder of the squadron will have similar problems,” Jenner said.  “Captain, with all due respect, this is a mission calling for a carrier and her escorts, not a survey ship and a handful of smaller or civilian vessels.”

“The Admiralty is deeply concerned about looking threatening, if the Builders are watching,” Staci said.  She’d made much the same argument herself – and she knew she wasn’t alone.  “They might respond badly if a fleet of overt warships enters their system and given their power, the last thing we want to do is piss them off.  No one wants to get into a fight with a civilisation that might be able to make the Sun go nova.”

Jenner raised his eyebrows.  “Is that even possible?”

“Theoretically,” Staci said.  She’d read the briefing notes very carefully.  “We know their gravity-manipulation technology is light years ahead of ours.  They might be able to start a chain reaction within a star that would lead to an explosion.  Or open a planet-sized wormhole and transport Earth to the other side of the universe.  Or simply twist space-time into a knot and knock our homeworld out of orbit.  They are so advanced we may not be able to comprehend what they could do to us, if they wished.”

She frowned, recalling the wilder briefing notes.  It had been like trying to account for magic and in a sense, that was exactly what they were doing.  The Builders had technology so advanced it might as well be magic.  Her briefers had pointed out that Alexander the Great or Napoleon would have had trouble accepting aircraft and nuclear weapons, while Churchill or Petraeus could have barely imagined the promise of space-based weapons and interstellar warships.  They would have had problems accepting even the most basic of such weapons, let alone understanding how they might be deployed.  They’d certainly have had problems adjusting their tactics to counter them.

If that is even possible, she thought.  How long would Napoleon’s Grand Army be able to stand against the original Royal Tank Regiment?

“The point remains, there may be other threats,” Jenner pointed out.  “How long until our alien allies start sending ships of their own?”

“Not long, I suspect.”  Staci shook her head.  “The politicians have made their decision.  We will do our best to look as harmless as possible, at least until we are sure the Builders are dead and gone.  They might prefer to leave the spheres completely alone, just to be certain we don’t provoke a super-race, but that isn’t going to be possible.”

“We’ve already jumped inside the sphere once,” Jenner said.  “The Builders might have noticed us.”

“Yeah,” Staci said.  “We simply don’t know.”

She stared down at her hands.  The spheres were clear proof of technology light years ahead of anything humanity had ever turned into reality.  She’d read briefing papers from researchers who were still in denial, insisting that the spheres were either impossible or impractical and that they simply couldn’t exist.  Their arguments made a certain kind of sense, she had to admit, but the spheres were clear proof the Builders disagreed.  She wondered, not for the first time, why they’d bothered.  Had they merely wanted to see if they could build a working sphere?

“There’s one thing in our favour,” Jenner said.  “Dyson One is in ruins.  If the Builders had been there, supervising, why didn’t they try to save it?  It might be proof they’re no longer with us.”

“It might,” Staci agreed.  “Of course, we have no idea what it takes to save a Dyson Sphere from coming apart.  We don’t even know what happened to the sphere.  Was it attacked?  Or was it a terrible accident?  Or ... or what?”

She shook her head.  “The Admiralty might be putting together a covering force, perhaps stationed in a nearby system, but even that is uncertain.  For the moment, the squadron will be alone – and far from help.  Even if we do extend the flicker network all the way to the sphere, it’ll be a long time before anyone can get a relief mission out to us.  We have to plan on the assumption we’ll be alone.”

“Yes, Captain.”

Staci smiled.  It was terrifying, true, but also exciting.  Whatever happened, when they reached the spheres, they were going to be the first to see it.  “Do you have any other points of concern?”

“Not as yet,” Jenner assured her.  “We should make our departure deadline with time to spare.  I’d like to run a few more emergency drills when the remainder of our passengers are embarked, but I’m not sure we’ll have time.”

He paused.  “One minor issue.  We’re going to have a lot of foreign military personnel on this ship.  It’ll be a security nightmare.”

Staci couldn’t disagree.  Endeavour herself was hardly new – none of the other spacefaring nations would have any trouble duplicating her – but there were quite a few pieces of classified technology and information onboard.  Keeping the secure datacores secure was going to be a headache, no matter what they did.  She wasn’t naive enough to think their passengers wouldn’t try to ferret out British secrets, even though the stakes were terrifyingly high.  The Great Powers might be locked in an uneasy alliance, but they were still rivals and anyone who fell too far behind might not be able to recover before it was too late.

“We’ll just have to cope,” she said.  “Disconnect the primary secure datacore from the datanet and keep it isolated, then purge the secondary datacore so we can use it for sensor records.  We should have a replacement command datacore in storage, just in case the primary unit gets compromised at some point.  Beyond that, there’s limits to what we can do without starting a diplomatic incident.”

Jenner chuckled.  “What a strange world we live in, where taking reasonable precautions would start an international crisis.”

“It is,” Staci agreed.  She keyed her terminal, bringing up the scans of the Dyson Spheres.  It was difficult, almost impossible, to wrap her head around the sheer scale of the megastructures.  She’d thought the navy’s construction yards were big, but the spheres made them look tiny.  It was easy, suddenly, to understand why some researchers still insisted the spheres couldn’t possibly exist.  “But we just have to cope.”

“Yes, Captain,” Jenner said.  They studied the image in silence for a long moment.  “Do you think the Builders are still around?”

“I don’t know,” Staci said.  “They were so advanced – realistically, they should have spread through the entire galaxy before the human race evolved.  It’s hard to imagine anything capable of wiping them out.  We should have found far more traces of their existence and yet ... we found almost nothing, until now.  We’ll just have to wait and see.”

Jenner smiled, then sobered.  “And if they do turn out to be hostile?”

Staci frowned.  “There’s no reason to think they might be overtly hostile,” she said.  “But they’re giants.  They could step on us by accident and never realise it.”

She paused.  “But Dyson One is in ruins,” she added.  “If nothing else, it is proof they are far from infallible – or all-powerful.”

Her lips quirked.  “Good news for us, don’t you think?”

Chapter Five: HMS Endeavour, Sol System

It was a long-standing naval tradition, Captain Colin Lancaster had been taught from the start of his career, that the Royal Marine contingent was effectively separated from the rest of the starship’s crew.  The marines were hardly discouraged from forming friendships – even romantic relationships – with outsiders, but there was always a gulf between the naval crew and the marines that was rarely, if ever, crossed.  Marine Country was an island in the sea of naval activity, a de jure autonomous region within a country ... an irony, he thought, given that the Troubles had been caused by de facto autonomous regions and ended by the regions being ruthlessly broken up and scattered.  It served a purpose, he’d been assured, but it also had its limits.  It was often hard for the contingents to understand each other.

He kept his face under tight control as the Royal Marines assembled in the briefing compartment.  Endeavour had never been a front-line warship and her Marine Country was little more than a handful of compartments, compartments that had seemed too cramped even before the return from Dyson Two.  Now ... with five new platoons assigned to the ship, the compartments were almost absurdly cramped.  Colin had put in a request to have Marine Country expanded – it was only a matter of switching out some compartments and replacing them – but it had been denied.  Endeavour was going to be playing host to hundreds of officers, diplomats, staffers and researchers and the marines were just going to have to cope.  Colin wondered, as his eyes passed over the assembled men, if it was even possible.  The marines were used to tight spaces, and hot-bunking, but there were limits.

And if we’re having problems, he reflected, the rest of the ship will be even worse.

He clasped his hands behind his back as the last of the marines trickled into the compartment.  His promotion had been something of a surprise and he suspected there’d been a great deal of high-level arguing before his superiors had quietly agreed to overlook his decision to introduce new technology to a primitive culture, but it had come with a price.  He’d expected to be reassigned to a whole new unit, to take up command of a company that hadn’t known him as a bootneck or a junior officer.  Instead, he’d been left on Endeavour and put in command of a makeshift company.  It was ... odd.

But then, there aren’t many officers who’ve crash-landed on a Dyson Sphere and lived to tell the tale, he thought.  That’s the sort of experience money just can’t buy.

“Attention,” Sergeant Ben Burris said.

Colin stepped forward, feeling eyes fixed on him.  He felt out of his depth.  He’d been in the Royal Marines for nearly five years and he knew he wouldn’t have been promoted so fast if his superiors hadn’t been so desperate.  His first CO had a breadth of service that made Colin’s look non-existent, save for his unwanted sojourn on the Dyson Sphere.  Privately, he wondered if Burris and the other NCOs had orders to keep a close eye on him, advise when possible and remove him from command if he spectacularly fucked up.  It was quite possible.  Burris had been in the Royal Marines for over a decade.  He’d forgotten more than Colin had ever known.

“I’ll make this quick,” he said.  He’d always disliked superior officers who wanked to the sound of their own voices and he had no intention of acting like them.  “Those of you I know, welcome back.  I hope you had a good leave.  Those of you who are new, welcome to the company.  We’ve been thrown together at short notice, and most of us don’t know each other, but it’s a long voyage to the Dyson System and we’ll spend most of it drilling and drilling until we know what we’re doing.  If you haven’t read the briefing notes on the sphere, be sure and do it as soon as possible.  We will be escorting researchers to the surface when we jump into the sphere.”

Colin paused, choosing his next words carefully.  It was hard to describe the sphere’s interior to men who’d never seen it, even if they had read the briefing notes and studied the recordings from the first mission.  It was like trying to explain colour to a man born blind.  He’d spent hours trying to determine a way to prepare them, only to draw a complete blank.  Some things could only be learnt through experience.

“If you have seen alien environments, forget them,” he said.  “The sphere isn’t anything like as alien as Tadpole Prime, or an infected world.  It is ... disconcerting.  The landscape appears as flat as any regular planet, if you are standing on the ground and unable to see the curves, but there is something about it that is subtly wrong.  You will either adapt very quickly, your mind convincing you that you’re on a planet, or find it impossible to adjust to the environment.  It will not be easy to cope.”

His words hung in the air for a long moment, then he went on.  “We will attempt to avoid contact with the natives, at least at first.  If that proves impossible, we will attempt to be diplomatic while withdrawing.  Our previous mission had an impact on the locals – literally – and we don’t know how far word of our presence, and innovations, might have spread.  We have to be careful.  The bigger the impact we make on the surface, the greater the chance we’ll draw attention from the Builders.  If they’re still around ...”

He let the words trail off.  They didn’t understand.  How could they, when they hadn’t seen the sphere with their own eyes?  The recordings might as well have been faked in a studio and broadcast to the world, for all the emotional impact they’d had.  There was no way to get across the sheer immensity of the spheres, or the sheer power of the species that had disassembled dozens of planets for the raw material to build them.  Colin had grown up in a rough area, and he was all too aware that some people were just too tough to be fought, but ... the gulf between Earth and the Builders was impossibly wide.  It was the difference between thinking about being punched in the face and actually being hit.  You didn’t understand it until it happened.

“We’ll be going through the files time and time again, to get you as prepared as possible,” he finished.  “Any questions?”

“Yeah,” someone said.  “I heard the women on the sphere are gagging for it.”

“That will do,” Burris snapped. 

Colin – somehow – kept from laughing.  “They seem very interested in genetic diversity,” he said, curtly.  It made a certain degree of sense.  Inbreeding was a very real threat, even with modern genetic modification technology, and if you lived in a relatively closed community with few members it made sense to try to bring in outside genes.  “They are also a matriarchal society, at least in the region we visited.  The sphere is so big there could be a hundred different kinds of society, all convinced they’re the only game in town.  And yes, when I was in the village, the women did try to seduce me.”

He scowled.  “That said, we will be keeping our distance until we know more about what’s really going on.  We have no idea why the Builders took humans from primal Earth and seeded them on the sphere, we have no idea if humans are the only species on the surface, we have no idea” – he grinned – “as you can tell, we don’t know a lot and half of what we do know is little better than educated guesswork.  We have to be careful.  We don’t know, either, if the Builders are still watching.  They may react badly to the innovations we introduced during our last visit.”

The words seemed to catch their attention.  “Once we’re underway, we will be exercising constantly to ready for the coming mission.  We will be going through all the files and practicing the local language, just in case we have to deal with the locals.  We will also be providing security for the command and diplomatic personnel, preparing for the day we make contact with the Builders.  It may happen.  It may not.”

He paused, again.  Did he sound too formal?  Did it matter?  “Sergeant Burris has your assignments,” he said.  “I want 1st Platoon to report back here at 1700.  The rest of you, take your lead from the sergeant.  Dismissed!”

The men turned and hurried out of the compartment.  Colin watched them go, wondering how he’d done.  Had he come across as a father to his men, or an officer who loved to hear himself talk?  It would be better, he was sure, to assign a more experienced officer to take command, even though he wouldn’t understand the sphere.  Colin would have been satisfied to remain a small-unit leader, although it might put an end to his career.  He wasn’t sure he’d be allowed to stay on active duty indefinitely.  The war was over.  Hundreds of thousands of officers and men were already being demobilised.  It was just a matter of time before the beancounters started wondering if they could afford to get rid of Colin too.

He sighed, inwardly.  There were nearly a hundred men under his command now.  He was responsible for each and every one of them.  If he fucked up, they’d be injured or killed or infected.  He didn’t want to think about the latter, but he knew it was a possibility.  No one knew where the virus had come from, or what else might be waiting in the darkness.  And if he got his men killed ...

Don’t think about it, he told himself.  Concentrate on keeping them alive.

***

“I’m surprised they let us keep our cabin,” Tobias said.  Technically, the cabin was for one person and one person only, but they’d managed to share the space on the return voyage and – so far –hadn’t been told to leave.  “Do you think they’re just waiting for us to get comfortable before they kick us out?”

Marigold Harkness shrugged as she unpacked her carryall and stuffed her clothes and supplies into the locker.  “They might think the space is too small for a high and mighty diplomat,” she said.  “Or that we’re attached to the staff now.”

“Or they just forgot about us,” Tobias countered.  He was used to people forgetting about him.  He was surprised the navy hadn’t fired his ass – discharged him – years ago, after the battle that had ended the war.  He’d been a good gunboat pilot, and then a shuttle pilot, but he was hardly the only one.  And he’d never made any pretence of being a naval lifer.  If it hadn’t been for conscription, he’d never have served.  “They’ll probably walk into the cabin tomorrow and act all surprised when they see us.”

Marigold made a rude gesture.  “Then don’t unpack your kit,” she said.  “You won’t want to waste time if they do kick us out.”

Tobias sighed, then sat on the bed.  It was only just large enough for both of them – and technically, they were bending regulations into a pretzel.  Technically.  Survey crews had a certain amount of latitude – their missions normally lasted years – but there were limits and sharing a single-bed compartment was pushing things as far as they would go.  And yet ... he wondered, again, why he hadn’t been discharged by now.  There weren’t many shuttle pilots who could say they’d crashed on a Dyson Sphere ...

Perhaps that’s the reason, he reflected.  They want to make use of my experience.

He sighed, again.  He hadn’t meant to crash-land.  If the alien defence platform hadn’t opened fire as soon as they’d entered the atmosphere, the shuttle would have landed and then taken off again without any problems at all.  Instead ... he shuddered, remembering the time he’d thought they would be stuck on the ground permanently.  If they hadn’t been able to get back to orbit ...

“We’ll see,” he said.  He wasn’t looking forward to flying around the sphere again.  It was impossible to know just what would draw attention from the Builders, or their automated servants.  They’d ignored human movements that should have drawn a response and overreacted to others.  It felt like playing an old computer game, one where the AI was barely capable of doing more than reacting to the human player.  “What’s on the mission sheet for tomorrow?”

Marigold passed him a datapad.  Tobias skimmed it.  Endeavour was going to be carrying dozens, perhaps hundreds, of researchers and the shuttle pilots had to bring them from the planet to the starship.  He wondered, idly, who’d put together the flight roster.  They were going to be flying nearly constantly for the next three or four days, travelling back and forth ... hell, they weren’t going to be alone.  There’d be quite a few shuttles making the trip to Endeavour, from all over the globe.  The ship was going to be very cramped by the time they left orbit and headed for the tramline. 

“Tomorrow will be a very busy day,” he said.  “What happened to our shore leave?”

“We just had it,” Marigold reminded him, a deadpan look on her face.  “Didn’t you see your mother and sister?”

Tobias scowled.  It felt weird to be famous, as one of the very few humans who’d set foot on Dyson Two and lived to tell the tale.  The reporters had apparently accosted his mother and then his sister, demanding background information they hadn’t been inclined to share.  His old headmaster, by contrast, had provided all sorts of titbits that had effectively been made up of whole cloth, from exaggerated claims about Tobias’s educational achievements to misleading statements that pushed the limits as far as they would go without becoming either blatant lies or slander.  Tobias had to admit the bastard had done a good job of claiming the credit without ever quite claiming it ... hell, he’d twisted the facts to make the school look good, something Tobias had thought impossible.  The happiest day of his life had been when he’d walked out the door and left school behind. 

“And then we went to see my family,” Marigold added.  “Don’t you remember?”

“Your family is nicer than mine,” Tobias said, although it wasn’t entirely true.  His mother wasn’t a bad sort – there were worse mothers– and his sister was lovely.  It was just ... he shook his head.  It felt wrong to be lionised by people who’d pretended he didn’t exist, if they’d known he existed at all.  It felt as if the other penny was going to drop at any second.  “They’re trying to get Mum to write my biography.”

“Ouch,” Marigold teased.  “They’ll find someone else to talk about soon enough.”

“Probably,” Tobias agreed.  He had no intention of permanently returning home.  Their plan to live in the Belt, or on a distant colony, had merely been delayed, not cancelled.  There was no way in hell he’d return home permanently.  Or honour the headmaster’s request that he grace the school with his presence long enough to impress anyone.  He doubted the headmaster would let him speak freely.  “I certainly hope so.”

Marigold stood.  Tobias tried not to stare.  She might not be the prettiest girl in the world – she was certainly nothing like the girls he’d admired and hated in equal measure, when he’d been a teenager who’d known he was doomed to live and die alone – but it didn’t matter.  Those girls had never shared his interests – or would never have admitted it, even if they had.  Marigold did.  They played the same games – as allies, as competitors – and flew the same craft.  The idea of losing her was terrifying.  He couldn’t stand the thought of life without her.

“It seems to me that you weren’t going to be famous, back home,” Marigold said.  “Correct?”

Tobias nodded, stiffly.  He hadn’t been a sporty kid, praised beyond all reason for scoring a handful of goals.  He hadn’t been a gorgeous girl, assured of attention as long as she kept her looks.  He hadn’t even been a sneak, sucking up to the headmaster in return for favours ... all he’d had, really, was being clever and he hadn’t been clever enough.  He’d hoped to escape the draft, but he’d failed.  It had been sheer luck the military had found something more useful for him than hefting a rifle around the battlefield. 

“No,” he said, finally.  If he’d joined the army, willing or not, he’d just have been another squaddie.  “Not a chance.”

“And you weren’t very popular either,” Marigold added.  “Correct?”

Tobias flushed.  “No.”

“And now they all regret it,” Marigold said.  “You’re famous.  You have clout.  You can go back to school and tell everyone if they work hard, and play computer games, you can accomplish something with your life.  Isn’t that true of Colin too?”

“I suppose.”  Tobias’s feelings for Colin were complicated.  The old bully had grown into a reasonably decent adult, but ... there were times when Tobias wondered if he should have taken the shot and blown Colin out of space.  It would have been easy to cover it up afterwards.  There’d been so many missiles and beams flying around it would have looked like a tragic accident, not murder.  “Do you think I should go speak at school?”

“Not if you don’t want to,” Marigold said.  “But you could give hope to some poor kid trapped in a nightmare and thinking about killing herself.  I’ve been there.”

“So have I,” Tobias admitted.  He’d been too much of a coward to kill himself.  It was funny how he could be brave while playing a game, or flying a gunboat, but not in real life.  But then, the gunboat was real life.  “I take your point.”

Marigold took the datapad.  “We’d better get some sleep,” she said.  “Tomorrow will be a very busy day indeed.”

Chapter Six: HMS Endeavour, Sol System

Charlotte wished, as she stood in the shuttlebay and watched the American shuttle land neatly on the deck, that there had been time to meet Admiral Dismukes before she’d flown to Endeavour herself.  It would have been ideal to meet him on neutral ground, or in an environment where she held the edge, if only to see what he was like outside his comfort zone.  Endeavour was hardly an American ship, but she was practically identical compared to the private clubs and meeting chambers of London, the natural environment of aristocrats, power brokers and their cronies.  Instead ... she put the thought out of her head and leaned forward as the hatch opened.  The Royal Marine guards snapped to attention.

She leaned forward, studying Admiral Dismukes thoughtfully.  The American was strikingly tall, with a neatly trimmed beard and elaborate dress uniform.  Charlotte was no military officer, but she’d spent enough time around military personnel to be fairly sure Admiral Dismukes was a uniformed bureaucrat rather than a fighting officer ... although, unless the American system was very different, flag officers spent most of their time in their offices rather than on deployment.  The thought cost her a pang.  Things might have been different if her husband – her ex-husband – had chosen to take the promotion and stay on Earth, rather than insist on remaining on his command deck.  Who knew?  Charlotte would have been happy shepherding his career until he reached the very top.

Bad rolls of the dice are inevitable, she reminded herself sharply.  She’d gambled and lost through bad luck and there was no point in regretting it now.  You just have to roll with them and press on to the bitter end.

She watched as Staci – Captain Templeton – greeted the Admiral, then introduced him to her senior officers and marines.  Charlotte’s ex had always bitched and moaned about having his ship serving as a flagship, with an admiral and his staff occupying the flag deck and peering over the captain’s shoulder, and Charlotte couldn’t imagine it would be any different even if the admiral was a foreigner.  It was not going to be easy to sort out the chain of command, not when there were so many nations involved.  The official chain of command looked simple.  The unofficial chain might be a little more complex.

God help us if we actually do run into trouble, she thought.  She’d spent the week studying the scenarios the analysts had put forward.  They ranged from considered assessments of what might be found within the alien ruins to flights of fancy that were too fanciful to be taken seriously.  She hoped.  What happens if we discover something we don’t want to share?

She put the thought aside as Staci led Admiral Dismukes to her.  “Admiral, Ambassador Hammond.”

Admiral Dismukes held out a hand.  Charlotte shook it politely.  “A pleasure,” the American said.  He had an  accent that suggested he’d spent most of his career in the South, although there were enough hints of other accents to suggest he hadn’t been born and raised there.  If he’d been British, Charlotte would have thought him a commoner who’d been granted a peerage and was trying to pretend he’d been an aristocrat all along.  “We’ll speak more after the reception.”

Charlotte nodded, politely.  “Of course, Admiral.  It would be my pleasure.”

She kept her face carefully blank as the reception wore on, making sure to exchange a few words with every single member of the admiral’s staff.  They were a curious mix, ranging from British and American officers to French, Russian and Chinese personnel.  Charlotte suspected the Great Powers were all terrified of the prospect of one of their rivals snatching a piece of alien technology for themselves and were doing their best to ensure nothing could be done in secret, although she feared it wouldn’t be enough.  The latest reports insisted a sizable number of ships – private, corporate, national – were already heading to the Dyson System.  She hoped – prayed – they’d have the sense to leave Dyson Two strictly alone.

The risk is incalculable, she thought, tiredly.  But so are the rewards.

It was almost a relief when the gathering finally came to an end and she made her way back to the diplomatic suite.  The cabins seemed to have grown smaller and more confining in the last two weeks, a reflection – she suspected – of how much time she’d spent on Earth since their return from the spheres.  It didn’t help her that much of her original diplomatic staff had been recalled and replaced with strangers, young men and women who might not have her best interests in mind.  Admiral Dismukes wasn’t the only person who had to worry about his staff having mixed loyalties.  In her case, her ability to reward or punish was very limited.

The buzzer chimed.  The hatch hissed open, revealing the admiral.  Charlotte was mildly surprised he hadn’t called her to his suite – technically, he was the superior officer – but she suspected he’d wanted a chance to tour Endeavour before the remainder of the squadron assembled and he had to go to work.  His eyes flickered from side to side, showing a hint of surprise at the cramped suite.  Charlotte understood, all too well.  If it had been a regular diplomatic mission, she would have sailed on a purpose-built diplomatic vessel with all the pomp and circumstance an ambassador could possibly want.

“Ambassador,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “I’m sorry about the delay.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Charlotte said.  She opened the hatch to the briefing compartment.  It was as cramped as the rest of the suite, but at least it would give them some privacy.  “Tea?  Coffee?”

Admiral Dismukes took a seat.  “Coffee would be fine, thanks,” he said.  “I take it you read the briefing papers?”

Charlotte wondered, as she poured two mugs of naval coffee, just what the CIA or DIA knew about her.  They’d have been sent a simple personnel file, when the mission planners had started putting the squadron together, but the file would have had all the interesting parts removed before it was sent into general circulation.  There was no way the Americans didn’t know at least some of the details – her separation from her husband had been a monumental scandal– yet she had no way to know precisely how much they knew.  What did they think of her?  Would they let it get in their way?  She felt a moment of anticipation as she passed him a mug, then sat facing him.  It was going to be an interesting challenge.  She could feel it in her bones.

“I did,” she said.  The naval coffee was strong and harsh, far stronger than anything she’d had back home.  It had taken her several weeks to get used to it.  The admiral didn’t seem to notice the taste.  “We have several sets of orders, depending on just what we find when we return to the sphere.”

“Unfortunately,” Admiral Dismukes agreed.  He sipped his coffee thoughtfully.  “It would be easier if the Builders showed themselves, so we could talk.”

“Be careful what you wish for,” Charlotte said.  She understood his thinking – almost nothing was known about the Builders – but she was also aware of the dangers of coming face to face with a super-race.  The Builders might be so far ahead of every other species that the gulf would never be surmounted.  What would happen if humanity’s collective nose was rubbed in its inferiority?  “We know nothing about them.”

“Save for the fact they dismantled entire star systems to construct their spheres, then kidnapped humans to populate them,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “And probably members of other races too.  Why should we be the special ones?”

“There’s no reason for them to think we’re special,” Charlotte said.  She’d read a few novels in which humans were the most innovative – or the most violent – species in the galaxy, but experience had taught the human race that they weren’t that special.  The aliens humanity had encountered had been just as innovative – sometimes more so – and equally capable of being violent.  “We are just one of many.”

Admiral Dismukes smiled.  “That’s an unusually” – he made a show of looking for the right word – “humble attitude.”

Charlotte met his eyes.  “The largest structure built by the human race is the Jovian power collector, which looks more like a framework than a solid structure,” she said.  “You can fly a starfighter through the gaps in the frame and pilots do, when they’re allowed.  And it is tiny, nothing more than an ant, compared to the sheer immensity of a solid shell wrapped around a star.  Two stars.  The boffins tried to work out just how much material we’d need to build a Dyson Sphere of our own and ...”

She shook her head.  “There’s no way to grasp the sheer size of the sphere until you gaze upon it with your own eyes.  It is so big it makes everything we built look like nothing.  It is ... humbling.  It’s like doing a painting, as a child, then looking at the words of the great painters and knowing you’ll never match their work.  Even if you get much better, they got there first.  Whatever we do in the future, the Builders will have already matched it.”

Admiral Dismukes nodded.  “My analysts are deeply concerned over just what the Builders were doing here, millions of years ago,” he said.  “Some think our star system was slated for dismantling and the Builders acted to preserve the early humans, others that the Builders were setting up a zoo or biological testing grounds.  The fact there’s no hope of the inhabitants ever getting off the ground, let alone out of the sphere, suggests they never thought we’d rise to their level.”

Charlotte nodded.  “Our analysts raised the same concerns,” she agreed.  “They’re not even sure precisely when our ancestors were taken.  It might not have been that long ago, on a cosmic timescale.”

“True,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “If we do encounter them, will they talk to us?”

“I wish I knew,” Charlotte said.  “There’s no evidence to suggest the Builders still occupy the sphere.  There’s no evidence to suggest they’re gone either.”

“But there is some evidence they monitor space around their spheres,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “The artefacts discovered during the war, for example.  They appeared to have some effect on the virus, yet ... they made no attempt to stop it.”

“As far as we know,” Charlotte said.  “The virus might have broken out of its prison.”

“Or they were just studying the virus and us, as a scientist might study microbes in water,” Admiral Dismukes countered.  “They operate on so great a scale that our wars must look like children battling over scraps.”

“Perhaps,” Charlotte agreed.  She was starting to like the admiral.  “We may never know.”

“No,” Admiral Dismukes agreed.  He took a breath.  “It has been agreed, as you know, that a special exclusion zone will be established around the Dyson System.  Explorations will be carried out under a multinational mandate, with everyone invited to take part on equal terms or be summarily excluded from the system.  We cannot afford amateurs poking their way through the system, perhaps stealing something important or – more likely – destroying it.  I got an earful from the archaeologists about the dangers of allowing untrained personnel to poke through the system without supervision.”

“It’ll be a diplomatic nightmare,” Charlotte said.  She wasn’t looking forward to that problem, when it reared its ugly head.  The rewards were so great she had no doubt everyone who was able would be sending ships to the spheres, if they hadn’t already.  “What happens if one of the interstellar powers starts sniffing around?  Or a completely new race?”

“That’s why they pay us the big bucks.”  Admiral Dismukes smiled, but there was little real humour in it.  Charlotte didn’t blame him.  Any mistake – when they reached the sphere – could be career-ending, or worse.  They might be scapegoated and thrown under the shuttlecraft if the incident threatened to lead to interstellar war.  “We have some latitude, when it comes to alien contacts, but none when our fellow humans are involved.”

Charlotte rubbed her forehead.  It really was going to be a nightmare.  “Do we have enough firepower to back it up?”

“In theory,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “In practice, we’ll have to wait and see.”

He leaned back in his chair.  “I won’t sugar-coat it.  If a single power gets sole control of Builder technology, or even enough insight into how it works to duplicate it, the results will be disastrous.  The nation that masters such power will be in a position to dominate the rest, which means the rest will go to war – now – to either demand a share of the tech or crush them before it is too late.  It is vitally important that we not only make sure everyone gets a look at any new discoveries, but that we make a show of doing it too.  We dare not let anyone get the slightest idea we’re withholding something from them.  It might start a war.”

Charlotte nodded, sourly.  As military technology advanced, and it became more and more plausible that a first strike could cripple or destroy an enemy before they could retaliate, the incentive to strike first – in self-defence – grew stronger and stronger.  It had been a nightmare when nuclear missiles had entered service and had only grown worse as humanity set up off-world colonies and started mining the asteroids for raw materials.  They’d been very lucky that technology hadn’t reached the point a first strike was utterly certain to succeed.  Charlotte liked to think she wouldn’t push the button, if that happened, but she couldn’t swear to it.  If it was a choice between hitting first or being hit, better to do the hitting.  There were billions of lives at stake.

And if someone really does gain such an edge, she mused, going to war before they can take advantage – and while we can still win – might be the sole option.

“I understand the stakes,” she said, finally.  “You do realise there’s no guarantee we’ll find anything?”

“I know,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “But do you realise how many politicians expect us to stumble across a library?  Or a technological how-to guide?”

Charlotte frowned.  On one hand, the odds of finding a piece of the most advanced technology on Earth at a random location were very low.  The planet’s surface wasn’t covered in technology, just waiting for someone to come along and pick it up.  But on the other, a modern public library might not have instructions for building the most advanced tech in the world, but what it did have would be very helpful for a primitive society.  The Roman Empire would have advanced by leaps and bounds if it had access to the British Library, even though most of the technology described in the books and datacores would be far beyond them.  It was a chilling thought.  What might they find that would be utterly harmless to the Builders, but alter the balance of power on Earth beyond repair?

To us, a steam engine is nothing more than a toy, she thought.  To the Romans, it would be a miracle beyond compare, the key to stabilising and securing their empire before it starts its decline.  And what might be the Builders have dismissed as nothing more than a steam engine ...?

“It’s unpredictable,” she said.  “There’s no way to plan ahead.”

“No,” Admiral Dismukes agreed.  “And that is why we have to be completely open with everyone.”

Charlotte nodded.  “I’ll do everything in my power to make sure we keep talking,” she said, dryly.  “And try to maintain a united front.”

“If you can,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “There are times when I think the best idea would be to quarantine the spheres and pretend we never found them.”

“It wouldn’t work,” Charlotte said.  “We need to know who built them and why.”

“And what they were doing here, millions of years ago,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “Why did they kidnap early humans to populate their sphere?”

Charlotte shrugged.  The analysts had come up with a lot of possible answers, none of which could be proven.  The Builders wanted to preserve the human race, on the assumption humanity would wipe itself out; the Builders wanted slaves, or captive animals, or even a biological reserve for reason or reasons unknown.  Some were more plausible than others – she doubted the Builders would have any need for human slaves, not when they were so fantastically advanced – but there was no way to be sure.  She had a private theory that the reasoning was truly alien.  It was never easy to guess which way an alien mindset would jump.  They were ... alien.

And the Builders have been a technological species for a very long time, she thought.  Their mindsets would have been shaped by their technology, in ways we can barely even begin to imagine.

Admiral Dismukes cleared his throat.  “We’ll be holding more meetings and planning sessions” – he couldn’t quite keep the irritation out of his voice – “over the next week.  That’ll be our last chance to refer anything back to our superiors, so we’ll at least try to hammer out all the details before departure.  You’ll chair some of the meetings?”

“Of course,” Charlotte said.  She’d never liked chairing meetings, but it was astonishing how much you could do if you took the lead or did all the petty administrative tasks no one wanted to be bothered with.  Or how many would-be Stalins you could head off at the pass by doing the work yourself.  “We’ll do our best to prepare for everything.”

“If we can,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “There are too many unknown unknowns, aren’t there?”

Charlotte remembered the sphere and shivered.  “Everything starts out as unknown,” she said, simply.  “Given enough time, we’ll unlock the sphere’s secrets and learn from them.”

“I hope you’re right,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “What normally happens when a more advanced culture meets a primitive one?”

“Nothing good,” Charlotte said.  “Nothing good at all.”

Chapter Seven: HMS Endeavour, Sol System

“All decks and stations report ready, Captain,” Jenner said.  “System Command has cleared us to depart.”

Staci nodded, despite her tiredness.  It had been a long week.  Plans had been drawn up, then revised, then revised again ... she had the feeling, as time ticked away, that certain parties were doing their best to leverage the expedition for their own political purposes or – worse – that they were buying time for private missions to make their way to the spheres and vanish within the ruins of Dyson One.  Staci had no illusions about how easy it would be for someone to remain unnoticed – there was so much wreckage orbiting the star that it posed a navigational hazard right out of a space opera written by someone who’d never been to space – or just how likely it was that someone was trying to gain an advantage for themselves.  For all she knew, there was a highly secret British team on their way to the sphere.  God knew it wasn’t impossible.

She keyed her console, bringing up the near-space display.  Task Force Clarke was holding position around the flagship, nineteen warships and research vessels ready to make their way to the spheres and start unlocking their secrets.  Ten freighters waited behind, nine crammed with everything they needed to set up an autonomous research station capable of supporting operations in and out of the sphere.  The tenth was loaded with trade goods.  Staci wasn’t sold on the idea of trying to make contact with the sphere’s inhabitants – she doubted they knew anything about the Builders, or indeed anything about their environment – but she’d been overruled.  There was little enthusiasm for leaving humans wallowing in their own ignorance, trapped in what might as well be an alien zoo.  It could not be borne.

“Good,” she said.  It had been a minor nightmare trying to keep all the foreigners from either getting into sensitive parts of the ship or injuring themselves.  She wished, not for the first time, that whoever had planned the mission had seen fit to include a passenger liner or even a colonist-carrier ship.  The latter would have been uncomfortable, but at least it was designed to make it harder for ignorant civilians to kill themselves.  “Are there any final messages?”

“No, Captain,” Jenner said.  “The board is clear.”

Lucky us, Staci thought.  The global media was watching.  The talking heads were speculating loudly, and uselessly, on just what they’d find; everyone else was arguing about everything from the divinity of the Builders to the wisdom of exploring a megastructure built by a super-race.  If someone doesn’t try to send us new orders before we cross the tramline, I will be astonished.

She sighed, inwardly.  It had been simpler – a lot simpler – during the war.  Or even during their first deployment, when no one had known what they’d find and their departure had been barely noted by the military.  Now ... she didn’t need to check her inbox to know her spam folder was crammed with everything from requests for interviews to offers of staggering amounts of money for nude images ... that message, at least, she’d taken some delight in forwarding to the reporter’s superiors.  It made her wonder just what the bastard thought he was paid to do.

And they keep asking for background information that’s a matter of public record, she thought, irritated.  They could track down my old school and family with a little effort, if they cared enough to try.

She put the thought aside and leaned forward.  “Helm, are we ready to depart?”

“Yes, Captain,” Lieutenant-Commander David Atkinson said.  “Course laid in, ready to depart on your command.”

Staci nodded.  She would have had some sharp words for him if the course hadn’t been laid in.  Any helmsman worthy of the role knew he had to be ready.  She’d certainly drilled the crew intensively over the past week.  She wasn’t expecting anything to go wrong – they were orbiting Earth, the very heart of humanity’s defences – but she knew from grim experience that when things went wrong, they did so very quickly.  She’d sooner go down in history as a martinet than someone who’d been caught by surprise by an enemy fleet and blown away before she could react.

We aren’t just a naval crew this time, either, she thought.  Endeavour was crammed to the gunwales with the admiral’s staff, the ambassador’s staff and hundreds of analysts, reporters and security experts.  If we get into trouble, hundreds of people will be in trouble along with us.

“Very good,” she said.  “Helm, take us out.  Communications, signal the squadron to follow us.”

“Aye, Captain.”

A low shudder ran through the ship as the drive came online.  Staci braced herself – if a drive node failed now, they’d be in deep shit – then breathed a sigh of relief as Endeavour slipped out of orbit and headed into space, the remainder of the squadron following like ducks shadowing their mother.  Her lips twitched at the thought – and at the ignorant think-pieces the reporters were going to write, complaining about her inelegant formation.  It didn’t matter – it really didn’t – if the ships flew in a proper formation, as long as they were heading in the same direction.  A loose formation was safer.  The risk of a collision was low – on an interplanetary scale, starships were little bigger than dust motes – but there was no point in taking chances.  They were heading so far from settled planets and stars that even the slightest accident could prove disastrous.

“Captain,” Lieutenant Commander Philip McDougall said.  “The tactical datalink network is online.  All datalinks have been checked and rechecked, all verification encryption codes have been exchanged.  The command datanet is coming online now.”

Jenner looked up.  “Is everyone sharing data?”

“As near as I can tell, sir,” McDougall said.  “There’s certainly nothing obvious missing from the warship datanets.  The civilian ships aren’t sharing anything beyond the bare minimum.  They don’t have mil-grade sensors or weapons.”

Staci nodded.  “If we run into trouble, the admiral will tell them to run while the warships cover their retreat,” she said.  “They’re not paid to stand in the line of fire.”

She leaned back in her chair.  “Mr XO, inform the crew that this is their last chance to write messages to their friends and family,” she ordered.  “We’ll empty the communications buffer before we cross the tramline.”

“Aye, Captain.”

Staci nodded, although she was fairly sure her crew had already written their final messages and sent them on.  Survey crews tended to be out of touch for years as they travelled outside the rim of explored space, their ships becoming their world until they finally turned and made their way back home.  The passengers were likely to be the ones rushing to write or record final messages, as well as updating their wills.  It was difficult for groundhogs to realise what it was like to travel beyond the flicker network, let alone how isolated they’d be from the rest of the human race.  Staci wondered, grimly, what would happen when the realisation finally struck home.

Lady Charlotte did alright, last time, she thought.  But Lady Charlotte had no reason to return home either.

She kept the thought to herself.  It was unlikely the civilians would cause any real problems when it finally hit them.  Probably.  There’d be problems when they returned, she suspected, but that wouldn’t be her responsibility.  She hoped the briefers had made it clear that there would be issues, from feeling trapped within the hull to fears about what lovers and spouses were doing back on Earth.  But they were going to explore Dyson Two.  She was sure that would eventually make up for everything.

Time ticked by, slowly.  Staci kept a wary eye on the constant stream of updates from the various departments, from the tactical staff running tracking exercises on the media ships shadowing them to the engineering staff checking and rechecking the drives as the squadron picked up speed.  Endeavour had been in service long enough for the various kinks to be worked out – there were horror stories about starships powering up their drives for the first time and suffering a catastrophic failure moments later – but it was well to be sure.  They really were going a long way beyond the borders of known and explored space. 

“Captain,” Atkinson said.  “We are nearing the tramline.  We’ll be crossing in twenty minutes.”

Unless we get recalled at the last moment, Staci thought.  It was unlikely, from what she’d seen, but it wasn’t impossible.  Quite a few voices seemed to think the Dyson Spheres should be left firmly alone.  A shame that isn’t going to be possible.

She dismissed the thought.  “Communications, signal the squadron,” she ordered.  “We’ll jump as soon as we cross the tramline.”

“Aye, Captain.”

“And empty the communications buffer,” Staci added.  “It’s time to go.”

“Aye, Captain.”

Staci waited, feeling oddly nervous.  It wasn’t her first jump, even as a commanding officer, but there was something about it that bothered her.  She wasn’t sure how to put it into words.  Last time, she hadn’t known what they’d find at the end of their voyage into the unknown; this time, they knew they were on their way to a pair of colossal alien megastructures built by an alien species of immense power and unknown motivations.  She felt like a child sneaking around her parents’ bedroom, or a student poking into a teacher’s office, the thrill of being somewhere she really shouldn’t matched by the fear of punishment if she was caught.  And yet ...

Silly, she told herself.  She’d once mocked the Jovian settlers who’d never been able to come to terms with the Great Red Spot, glaring down on Ganymede like the eye of an angry god.  She knew, now, how they’d felt.  The Great Red Spot was natural.  The spheres were anything but.  There’s no reason to think the Builders are watching us.

Sure, her thoughts answered.  And there’s no reason to think they’re not either.

Jenner glanced at her.  “Here we go ...”

Staci nodded.  “Helm, jump as soon as we cross the tramline,” she ordered.  “And then continue with our planned course.”

“Aye, Captain.”

The last seconds ticked away.  Staci braced herself, even though it would be as gentle a transition as possible.  The civilians weren’t going to enjoy it ... she watched the display, the tramline a thread of blue light clearly visible dead ahead of the ship.  It was hard to believe there was nothing there, as far as the naked eye was concerned.  It seemed wrong, somehow, that it couldn’t be sensed ...

Her stomach heaved as the display blanked, then rebooted.  The communications datalinks vanished.  Staci sucked in her breath, instincts sharpened in the fires of war screaming that something was terribly wrong.  They had lost the command datanet ... she calmed herself with an effort, reminding herself that they had jumped into friendly territory.  Or at least human territory.  Terra Nova had been calming down before the virus had made its presence known, triggering off yet another round of civil war.  It was no surprise to her that everyone who could leave the planet was already on their way out.  Better a first-stage colony on the edge of explored space than a nightmarish world where you could be enslaved or raped or murdered for being the wrong religion or race or merely in the wrong place at the wrong time.

The display blinked, then started to fill up as the datalinks came back online.  Staci scowled in disapproval.  It had taken too long to re-establish the datanet.  She hadn’t expected that much from the civilian ships, but military personnel knew they could be attacked at any moment.  If someone had been watching the squadron leave Earth, they could predict – roughly – where they’d cross the tramline and set up an ambush.  And if that happened, the first missiles would be flying right into the squadron’s blind spot ...

The admiral will have to work on that, Staci thought.  If that had happened on Unicorn, her old captain Mitch would have been lucky if he’d only had the admiral calling to chew him a new arsehole.  It could have easily been defined as a court-martial offense.  Two years since the war, more or less, and standards have already slipped.

She sighed inwardly.  Hundreds of officers and thousands of enlisted men had died.  God alone knew how many had been infected and turned into mindless host bodies or transformed into zombies and turned against their former comrades.  Their replacements had lacked their training and experience, although they’d learnt fast.  It had been the only way to stay alive.  She was painfully aware that only a handful of her graduating class had survived the war.  And now the navy was paying the price.

“Captain,” Jenner said.  “The squadron has completed transit and is falling in behind us.”

“We’ll be crossing the next tramline in seventeen hours,” Atkinson put in.

“Hold course and speed,” Staci ordered.  Endeavour could reach the tramline a great deal quicker if she left the freighters behind, but there was no need to hurry.  The admiral was already directing a destroyer to fly ahead of them, watching for possible ambushes.  It was unlikely, but ... Staci had been a child when the Second Interstellar War had started with a bloody ambush that had nearly destroyed an entire fleet.  “This isn’t a race.”

She keyed her console, checking the reports again.  There’d been no problems, save for a handful of groundhogs throwing up the moment the ship crossed the tramline.  Staci felt a stab of sympathy, mingled with the grim awareness it probably wasn’t going to get any better if they didn’t get used to it.  There were some poor souls who were natural-born groundhogs, unable to so much as fly into orbit without getting sick, but she’d thought they’d be careful not to take up a post that required interstellar travel.  She shook her head – if worse came to worst, they could arrange a transfer to a colony world – then checked the datanet.  It just didn’t come up to wartime standards.  The admiral really would have to do something about it.

Staci stood.  “Mr XO, you have the bridge.  I’ll be in my ready room.”

“Aye, Captain,” Jenner said.  “I have the bridge.”

Staci took one last look at the display – Terra Nova might be fighting yet another civil war, but there was a surprising amount of unregulated activity in the rest of the system – and headed into her ready room.  The sofa looked very inviting, but she forced herself to walk past the makeshift bed and sit at her desk.  There were already more reports on her terminal, though none marked as urgent.  She made a mental note to review the reports later, then dismissed them.  Anything genuinely urgent would have been brought to her attention by now.

The buzzer chimed. Staci looked up.  “Come.”

“Captain,” Lady Charlotte said as she stepped inside the room.  She sounded as calm and composed as if she were ordering afternoon tea in a club, rather than standing on the deck of a starship heading back to a pair of very alien megastructures.  “Thank you for seeing me.”

Staci nodded, slowly.  Lady Charlotte wasn’t the villain Staci had thought, when they’d first met, but it was unlikely they’d ever be friends.  “You’re welcome.”

“It’ll be quite some time before we reach the spheres,” Lady Charlotte said.  “I take it there’s no way we can get there quicker?”

Staci bit down the urge to suggest the older woman stepped outside and pushed.  “I’m afraid not,” she said.  She wasn’t sure if Lady Charlotte was joking.  “The voyage would still take several weeks even if we abandoned the civilian ships and pushed our drives as far as they would go without burning out the drive nodes.”

Lady Charlotte nodded.  “Understood,” she said.  “I may have to have a couple of my staff sedated for the next jump.  They didn’t take it very well.”

“We can arrange a transfer to the nearest planet or settlement, if they don’t get used to the jump sensation,” Staci said, echoing her earlier thoughts.  “But otherwise, there isn’t much we can do beyond sedation.”

“I’ll discuss it with them, if they don’t get better,” Lady Charlotte said.  “On a different note, I’d like to organise a dinner for the senior officers and researchers.  Would you like to attend?”

Staci frowned, inwardly.  She’d never liked formal dinners.  One advantage of serving on Unicorn had been that she was rarely asked to attend them and never ordered to arrange one.  The ship had been too small to host a proper gathering.  Endeavour, on the other hand, was large enough to host a dinner and was crammed with passengers who’d expect to be invited ...

“If I’m invited,” she said, finally.  It was her ship.  It was unthinkable she wouldn’t be.  It was also unthinkable she’d say no, unless something came up ... her mischievous side wondered if she could arrange an emergency, or a drill, in the middle of dinner.  She put that thought firmly out of her head a moment later.  It would be grossly irresponsible.  “I have no objection to you holding a dinner, as long as it doesn’t get in the way of the crew’s duties.”

“It won’t,” Lady Charlotte promised.  “My staff can handle most of the preparatory work.”

Staci nodded, although she had her doubts.  “Tell them to liaise with the ship’s cooks,” she said.  “The crew has to be fed, or I’ll have a mutiny on my hands.”

Lady Charlotte smiled.  “That would be embarrassing,” she said, with commendable understatement.  “When was the last mutiny in naval history?”

Staci had to think about it.  “There was a commanding officer removed from command for incompetence in the face of the enemy,” she said, slowly.  “The affair was whitewashed, suggesting there were excellent grounds for mutiny.  Even so ...”

She shrugged.  “Just make sure you work with the cooks.  We really don’t want a starving crew.” 

Chapter Eight: HMS Endeavour, In Transit

Charlotte had always prided herself on being a good hostess.  She had been – her parties had once been the talk of the ton, her private gatherings a mark of status guaranteed to please those who were invited and have the uninvited gnashing their teeth in envy – but it had been harder to host anything after her fall from grace.  Impossible, really.  She’d had very few friends willing to attend her gatherings and she’d known, without making the attempt, that even trying would have led to embarrassment and humiliation.  There were people who might have spoken to her discreetly, while alone, but wouldn’t have been seen dead with her in public.  None of them were willing to put friendship, or even common decency, ahead of their place in society.  She supposed she couldn’t blame them.  The odds of her rising from the ashes and becoming something great – on her own merits – had been very low.

Particularly after Mitch died, she thought, sourly.  She’d liked him right away, fell in love with him, and cared deeply for him.  She believed it had been in Mitch’s best interests to go  to the very top, but his death had left her bereft.  She knew she’d been lucky to get the assignment to Endeavour and return in triumph and yet, far too many people were keeping their distance, unsure what to make of her.  I’ll have to do it on my own merits or not at all.

She leaned against the bulkhead and watched the guests as they circled the room.  It looked like a simple meet-and-greet, with a buffet laden with food and drink, rather than a formal dinner, but she’d put days of work into arranging every last detail.  The admiral and his staff, the diplomats and their staff, the researchers and the starship captains and everyone else hadn’t had a proper chance to meet, not until now.  She’d hoped to encourage a certain degree of cross-departmental chatter by cutting the formalities down to the bare minimum and, from what she could see, it seemed to be working.  It wasn’t perfect – the researchers and diplomats were chatting openly, while the naval staff were keeping their distance – but it was a start.

A bigger dinner would require more planning and formalities, she thought, wryly.  And it would make it harder for people to talk freely.

Her lips twisted into a brief smile.  She’d attended enough state dinners in her time, as a young girl, to know they were extremely boring to just about everyone, save for the relative handful of diplomats and staffers who thrived on the perks of their job.  Personally, she’d always thought the politicians would be better off having small private gatherings, where they could let their hair down and chat freely, secure in the knowledge there’d be no reports of embarrassing behaviour in the media the following day.  It was always easier to deny something if there were no witnesses who couldn’t be easily cajoled, bribed or threatened into silence.  If it wasn’t so risky to have politicians take the lead on negotiations, she thought that private meetings would be standard, and half the diplomatic staff unceremoniously reassigned up north.

She kept her face politely neutral as she circled the room, making sure to share a few words with everyone.  She’d always enjoyed making introductions and smoothing over disputes, then watching to see what came of it.  She knew for a fact that at least four marriages had had their genesis at one of her parties ... the thought made her heart twist, suddenly, as she remembered she’d never have the chance to shape either of her daughters’ coming out parties.  The plans she’d had would probably go by the wayside ... she wondered, sourly, if her ex would come up with something himself or hire a planner to do it for him.  It wasn’t as if he could ask her, not now.  She gritted her teeth, then firmly banished the thought.  She’d have a chance to rebuild her relationship with her children later, after she returned from the spheres.  She couldn’t be ignored now.

“The Builder tech is advanced, true,” Professor Mike Mansion was saying, addressing a handful of diplomats and researchers.  Charlotte stopped to listen.  “It is not, however, magic.  We can understand what they do even though we cannot – yet – duplicate it.”

Charlotte leaned forward, just to make sure the conversation kept going.  “How so?”

“Gravity is the force that binds the universe together,” Mansion said.  “It does everything from keeping planets orbiting stars to creating tramlines that link star systems together, tramlines we use to hop from system to system.  The effect is very pronounced, even when it isn’t noticeable.  Jupiter has an effect on Earth’s tides, for example, but that effect is so tiny it might as well not exist.  The tramlines, too, require advanced technology to detect, let alone ride.  The early researchers even speculated they were composed of pseudogravity, rather than real gravity, and came up with elaborate models that suggested they were akin to holographic projections and had about as much impact on the universe.  They might have been right.  You can’t use a tramline without a jump drive.”

He paused.  “The Builders generated and shaped their own beams of pseudogravity and aimed them across the system, like spotlights.  When the beams met, the combination of pseudogravity fields created a gravimetric eddy they could use to manipulate objects at a distance.  Rather like” – he made a show of searching for an example – “blowing up a balloon and then letting it go, so the air outflow pushed the balloon into the air.”

“With a little more control, one hopes,” a diplomat said.  “Balloons fly in random directions.”

“I certainly hope so,” Mansion agreed.  “We did look at the concept of laser sails, back in the early days of spaceflight.  The pseudogravity beamers are essentially the same thing, only much – much – more effective.  They could use them to steer the sphere’s plates into position and then hold them there long enough to lock them in place.  They also don’t need to worry about starships entering or leaving the sphere.  They can just use the eddies to leverage them in and out, without risking any damage to the ships.”

“They’d also make one hell of a weapon,” a military officer said.  “Can we counter the gravity beams?”

Mansion looked uncomfortable.  “It’s hard to say,” he said.  “They’d have to focus the beams to create a gravity eddy inside one of our ships ... it depends, really.  The computer models suggest they could create a gravity well, perhaps even a pseudo black hole, but we think they’d be reluctant to risk it inside the sphere.  It would be like using a nuke to kill an ant in your capital city.”

Charlotte shivered.  She’d lived a sheltered life, compared to some, but – perversely – it had made her all the more aware that there were some people insane, or isolated, enough to want almost anything.  It was easy to damage your position – or personal finances – beyond repair if you had no real grasp of how the world worked, let alone what would happen if you started doing things at random.  Her father had once likened it to cutting off a tree branch, without realising you were sitting on the branch and would fall with it ...

“Unless that is what happened to the shattered sphere,” a reporter said.  “Did they have a civil war?”

“It’s hard to imagine a race so advanced fighting a war,” the diplomat put in.  “What did they have to fight over?”

“Many of our old problems are gone,” the military officer countered.  “We can feed ourselves.  We have access to the boundless resources of interstellar space.  There’s no need to engage in wars of conquest, or religion, or anything else.  And yet, we keep fighting, each other as well as alien races.  For all we know, they ran into a race that couldn’t be reasoned with and found themselves in a war of extermination.”

“We had to exterminate the virus,” the diplomat said.  “We simply didn’t have the tech to contain it.  But the Builders did have the tech to preserve themselves, to ensure the virus couldn’t spread further.”

“And they might have run into a race as advanced as themselves, without the ability or willingness to talk to other life forms,” the military officer said.  “We simply don’t know.”

Charlotte frowned.  Humanity had assumed it was alone in the universe, only to discover they were wrong.  And then ... she knew a great many diplomats had assumed that any race that climbed into space was basically rational, that they could talk to their human counterparts and smooth out any points of friction between them, that there would never be any need for war ... an assumption that had been deeply problematic even before the virus had arrived, the faceless alien foe humanity had dreaded from the moment it had realised there might be life on other worlds.  Who knew?  The Builders might not recognise humanity as an intelligent race ...

Which might not be so implausible, she though, reflecting on just how many dumb things humanity had done over the years.  She’d known someone at university who’d scorched his bottom while trying to light his own farts, the kind of thing that was hilarious if you were a teenager and hellishly depressing if you were a few years older.  We used to joke about aliens picking up our early TV broadcasts and deciding the human race needed to be destroyed before we spread our influence across the galaxy.

The reporter leaned forward.  “So ... what did happen to the shattered sphere?”

“There’s no way to know,” Mansion said.  “We’ve been unable to determine when the sphere shattered, let alone what caused it.  We know so little about the underlying structure of the spheres that anything we say might as well be guesswork.  We assume, for example, that there are gravity generators within the sphere’s superstructure that provide surface gravity, but – again – we simply don’t know.  Our computer models suggested there’d be kinks within the gravity field, perhaps allowing us to track down the generators, yet ... nothing was spotted during the first voyage.  We simply don’t know.”

“Hah,” the reporter said.  “Is there anything you do know?”

“The limits of our ignorance?”  Mansion smiled as titters ran around the small group.  “We will be studying the spheres carefully, in the hopes of salvaging alien technology for analysis and reverse-engineering.  We will also be studying the data recovered from probe missions in hopes of working out how the alien tech works, then putting together our own hardware to duplicate the effect.  There is no way I can give you a timetable.  We might stumble across an intact alien library the day after we arrive, or spend the next few centuries exploring the twin spheres without finding anything more than we already know.  If you’re hoping for easy answers, or someone to wave a magic wand and put advanced tech into mass production, you will be disappointed.”

“But ...”  The reporter leaned forward.  “We put Tadpole tech into mass production in only a few short months.”

“The gap between their tech and ours wasn’t that wide,” the military officer explained.  “Their plasma guns were more advanced than ours, and so was their jump tech, but we had both technologies under development already and all we really had to do was use samples of their technology to fill in the gaps in our own knowledge.  The real problems came when we tried to duplicate their computers, but lucky we didn’t need them to push the Tadpoles back and eventually come to terms.  The Builders were so much more advanced that it will be a long time before we match their tech.”

“And that assumes they’re not still around, watching us,” the diplomat said.  “There’s a whole theory that suggests the Dyson Spheres are little more than a test for younger races.”

“Which is absurd,” the military officer said.  “Even for the Builders, building the spheres must have been an unimaginably expensive and challenging project.  One of the spheres even shattered ...”

Charlotte turned as she sensed someone approaching.  “Madam Ambassador,” a young Chinese girl said.  “Admiral He would like the pleasure of your company.”

“It would be my pleasure,” Charlotte said. 

She studied the girl thoughtfully as they crossed the compartment.  The young woman spoke English like a native and wore a dress designed to make her look like an ingénue, sweet and innocent enough to make Charlotte feel positively dowdy.  A spy ...?  It wasn’t impossible.  Intelligence services the world over knew how easy it was for a young, pretty and apparently harmless girl to get a man talking, spilling his innermost thoughts to a sympathetic ear.  And if there weren’t spies attached to the mission, she would be astonished.

“Ambassador,” Admiral He said.  His English was perfect too, although that wasn’t surprising.  English had been the common language of spaceflight since the very first men had been launched into space.  “I’m sorry we didn’t have a chance to meet earlier.”

“I quite understand,” Charlotte said.  She knew from experience the military officers would be very busy during the first week, sorting out the chain of command and holding simulated drills to smooth out any problems before they actually ran into hostile aliens.  It was a minor matter in the grand scheme of things.  “I hope you are enjoying yourself?”

“The gathering is interesting, and informative,” Admiral He said.  He kept his voice calm and polite.  Charlotte was fairly sure it was an act.  It was rare for military personnel to enjoy diplomatic gatherings.  Mitch and Thomas certainly hadn’t.  “There may have been some political issues, over the last few months, but that doesn’t mean we can’t work together.”

Charlotte kept her face carefully blank, hiding her surprise.  The French and Russians had lodged loud protests after Endeavour’s return, insisting Britain had technically violated the Solar Treaty and should face severe sanctions.  The protests had been pro forma and no one had expected them to come to anything, but ... they’d had to be made.  The Americans, too, had lodged protests ... the Chinese, oddly, hadn’t matched the volume of their French and Russian counterparts.  Charlotte had wondered if they’d seen no point in bothering, but ... it was odd.  They could certainly use the incident as a way to pressure Britain into making later concessions ...

Unless they’re breaking the treaty too and want a precedent they can use to avoid sanctions of their own, she thought.  There were odd rumours of a distant Chinese settlement finding something unusual, perhaps even something alien, but none of those tales had ever been confirmed.  She’d heard suggestions the stories were little more than lies told to attract settlers, which might be true.  Or they have something else up their sleeve.

“I certainly hope so,” she said, blandly.  She had to be diplomatic.  “It is important we maintain a united front if other aliens, or the Builders themselves, show up.”

Admiral He nodded, politely.  “Do you think they will?”

“I think it is just a matter of time until the Tadpoles or Foxes send ships to the spheres,” Charlotte said.  Aliens had problems inserting agents on Earth – and vice versa – but she was fairly sure they monitored unsecured human broadcasts.  The BBC had probably told any alien listeners everything they needed to know.  “And then we may wind up squabbling over anything we find.”

“Or the Builders themselves?”  Admiral He leaned forward.  “Do you think they’re still around?”

Charlotte shrugged.  “It’s hard to say,” she said.  “Their gravitational technology is far in advance of ours.  It seems unlikely they missed our arrival when we jumped into the sphere, or when we sent shuttles to the surface.  They must have noticed when their automated platforms fired on the shuttles, surely.  Do we allow our weapons to fire on possible targets without a human in the loop?”

“Sometimes, but only during wartime,” Admiral He said.  “They didn’t try to confirm the shuttle’s destruction.”

“True,” Charlotte agreed.  She knew how close she’d come to death.  An inch closer and the entire shuttle she’d been on would have been vaporised.  “But we were very lucky to make it down in one piece.”

“You still made it,” Admiral He said.  “That suggests a genuinely automatic system.  It took a shot, assumed you were dead and didn’t bother to shoot again.  As long as you didn’t do anything to trigger a response, you were relatively safe.”

“Perhaps,” Charlotte said.  “It fired on radio transmitters as well as incoming shuttles.”

“Which also suggests an automatic system,” Admiral He said.  “If you knew someone had a radio, somewhere no radio should be, wouldn’t you be just a little curious?  Wouldn’t you want to know how that radio had reached the sphere?”

“I would, yes,” Charlotte said.  The sphere was designed to ensure nothing more advanced than the wheel went into mass production.  There were theories suggesting the locals could get around the restrictions, but most of them struck her as implausible.  They required a degree of advanced chemistry and suchlike the locals couldn’t hope to master, not without centuries of research and a great deal of luck.  “But the Builders weren’t human.”

“Unless you believe the people who insist the Builders really were ancient astronauts and Earth is a colony world of a vast star-spanning empire,” Admiral He said.  “Absurd, of course.”

“Of course,” Charlotte agreed.  She’d seen the theories.  She’d also read the debunkings ... and the increasingly spurious arguments the  believers used to justify their arguments.  She would sooner believe the virus had constructed the sphere rather than ancient humans.  Surely, if such a community existed, it would have left traces of its presence scattered across the solar system.  “They cannot have been human.”

“And everything suggests they are no longer around,” Admiral He said.  “Which raises interesting possibilities, doesn’t it?”

Chapter Nine: HMS Endeavour, Dyson System (Exterior)

“Captain,” Commander Mike Jenner said.  “We are ready to jump.”

Staci sucked in her breath, bracing herself.  It wasn’t exactly a combat jump – there was certainly no reason to think they were going right into a war zone – but the alien tramline was ... odd.  The Builders had extended it – somehow – to the point a single jump would take them thirty light years in the blink of an eye, something everyone had previously considered impossible.  The Royal Navy wanted the technology desperately.  So did everyone else.  If they could establish tramlines running between Earth and her most distant colonies ...

She forced herself to sit back and relax.  “The squadron?”

“Holding position, Captain,” Lieutenant Andy MacPhee said.  The communications officer didn’t look up from his console.  “Dasher is in position to jump with us; the remainder of the squadron will wait for the all-clear.”

Charming, Staci thought.  She had been torn between urging the admiral to send a pair of destroyers ahead of the main fleet, just to make sure it was safe to jump, and the long-standing naval tradition that the admiral accompanied the first ship to jump.  If we don’t return, who knows what they’ll do?

She sighed inwardly.  She’d read a hundred novels of naval service, as a child, and none of them had managed to convey just how boring interstellar transit could be.  The drills and exercises had rapidly lost their excitement as the kinks were smoothed out, leaving the squadron ready for anything ... at least, she reminded herself, anything conventional.  No one really knew what the Builders could do to the human fleet, if they decided not to be welcoming.  She’d spent too many days catching up with paperwork, writing reports and touring her ship from top to bottom, making sure she knew every last inch of the hull.  And she had still been bored.  But now ...

“Signal the squadron,” she ordered.  “We’ll jump in one minute.”

She glanced at Jenner.  “Alert our guests.”

“Aye, Captain.”

Staci smiled, despite the growing tension.  The guests had grown used to jumps, save for a poor astrophysicist who’d had to be sedated before each jump, but this one was different.  There could be anything on the far side, anything at all, and all the guests were going to be locked out of the loop, waiting helplessly until the terminals were turned on and they gained access to the live feed from the ship’s sensors.  Staci had never enjoyed the sensation of being unaware of what was going on, when she was a junior officer, but at least she’d had her duties to distract her.  The guests had no such consolation.  Even the admiral was little better than a spectator.  It was her show.

“Thirty seconds,” Atkinson said.  “Jump engines primed, ready to jump; standard drives powered, ready to come online.”

“Weapons and defences primed, ready to come online,” McDougall added.

Staci nodded, stiffly.  The tactical staff had strict orders not to power up their weapons without orders, unless there was a very real incoming threat.  She’d heard the grumbling and understood, even if she couldn’t admit it out loud.  If there was a threat, the seconds it would take to bring the weapons and defences online might be too long to save the ship from a volley of incoming missiles.  But ... she kept her face blank.  There was no reason, she reminded herself, to think they were going to jump straight into danger.  They’d picked a jumping point nearly seven light hours from Dyson One.

And further from Dyson Two, she thought.  Unless they have FTL sensors, or something else that might as well be magic, they won’t notice our arrival for hours.

Her thoughts hardened.  It isn’t completely impossible here, is it?

The thought nagged at her mind.  She understood human technology.  She could calculate the possibilities, as human tech advanced, and use it as a baseline for advanced alien tech.  But the Builders were so far ahead of the human race that any estimates of their capabilities were little more than guesswork ...

“Jumping in five,” Atkinson said, breaking into her thoughts.  “Four, three, two, one ... jump!”

The universe seemed to sneeze.  Staci grunted, feeling as if someone had poked her in the belly ... maybe not hard enough to double her over, but hard enough to feel.  Someone coughed and gagged behind her ... she made a point of not looking around, trusting her command staff to either recover quickly or call a replacement if they couldn’t handle their duties.  The display blanked, then rebooted.  A yellow star appeared in front of her, surrounded by a haze ... Staci sucked in her breath.  She’d seen it before, the first time they’d entered the system, but it was still striking.  And impossible, at least until now.

The idea of starfighters zipping through an asteroid field to avoid pursuit has always been absurd, she thought.  She’d seen the movies, but reality had crushed those dreams very quickly.  But here, it’s actually possible to fly through the field, coming within bare millimetres of striking chunks of rock ...

“Jump completed, Captain,” Atkinson reported.

“No incoming threats,” McDougall added.  “We appeared to be alone.”

“No signals from Dyson One or Two,” MacPhee reported.  “I request permission to transmit the wake-up codes to the drones we left behind, last time.”

“Do it,” Staci ordered.  “Helm?  Were there any problems with the jump?”

“No, Captain,” Atkinson said.  “The power curves were nominal.  If it wasn’t for the sheer distance we jumped, I’d say it was completely routine.”

Staci nodded, resting her eyes on the display.  The shell surrounding Dyson One was stunning.  She couldn’t help thinking of a shattered egg, coming apart to reveal the yolk inside.  It was difficult to grasp, still, the sheer scale of the superstructure, or how many lives might have been lost when it came apart.  And yet ... she wondered, suddenly, if she had almost grown used to the sensation.  It was purely defensive.  The more she thought about it, the more uneasy she became.

“Helm, take us off the tramline,” she ordered.  “Communications, transmit the planned greeting.”

“Aye, Captain.”

Staci heard the doubt in the officer’s voice and nodded to herself.  They’d spent days, the first time they’d stumbled into the binary system, trying to contact the Builders.  They’d used radio and lasers and everything else, from the sensible to the absurd, only to receive nothing but complete silence in return.  Some analysts thought it was clear proof the Builders were no longer watching the spheres, others that the Builders were simply too advanced to notice something as primitive as radio signals.  Staci supposed it was at least possible.  Modern militaries still used Morse Code, but they didn’t use smoke signals.

But we would have tried, if we could figure out how to do smoke signals in space, she thought.  We really were desperate to hear something from them.

She kept the thought to herself as the hours passed slowly.  The internal communications net filled with chatter as the guests saw the sphere for the first time and, finally, came to understand just how immense it truly was.  Dyson Two was a brooding presence over two light days away, invisible to the naked eye but easily visible to her sensors.  She wondered, idly, how long the admiral was prepared to wait until he took the squadron – or at least a handful of ships – into the sphere.  This time, at least, they knew what to expect.  The sphere wasn’t a complete unknown.

And yet, some people insist we made a mistake when we jumped inside, she reminded herself, grimly.  We could have started a war.

“Captain,” MacPhee said.  “I am detecting no signals from either of the spheres.  However, I picked up a handful of encrypted transmissions that were rapidly silenced.”

Jenner looked up.  “Alien?”

“I don’t believe so,” MacPhee said.  “The computers are still trying to decrypt the signals, but they look like human commercial-grade encrypt codes to me.  Probably from the Belt.  They’re very keen on not sharing decryption algorithms with anyone.”

“Humans,” Staci said.  “Scavengers?”

“We knew it was possible,” Jenner said.  “For all we know, hundreds of ships set out shortly after we returned home.”

“Forward the data to the admiral,” Staci said.  “Is there any other change in the system, anything noticeable?”

“Not as far as I can determine,” Lieutenant Helen Yang said.  The sensor officer didn’t lift her eyes from her console.  Staci understood.  There was so much data flowing into the sensors that sorting it out required a human mind.  “Our position isn’t the best for observation, but there’s nothing to suggest any major changes.  We’d need to go closer to be sure.”

“And the scavengers have already gone closer,” Staci said.  She doubted they’d have found anything important, not when they had to search the remains of a genuine superstructure, but it was impossible to be sure.  It wouldn’t be the first time someone had beaten impossible odds to win the day.  “Can you locate any active scavengers?”

“No, Captain,” Helen said.  “They’ve probably tamped down their drives and sensors already.”

And we were kind enough to let them know we were here by signalling the entire system, Staci thought coldly.  It wasn’t exactly unexpected, but it was still irritating.  They’ll have plenty of time to hide before we can come after them.

She put her irritation aside.  “Signal Dasher,” she ordered.  “She is to return through the tramline and summon the remainder of the squadron.”

“Aye, Captain,” MacPhee said.

Staci glanced at her terminal – the guests were still wowed by the sphere – then looked back at the display.  More and more detail was starting to appear, from chunks of debris bigger than Earth to ‘tiny’ pieces that were easily large enough to host the entire squadron.  It was difficult to believe what she saw, no matter how much she studied the display.  Some pieces of debris were practically holding their positions in orbit, while others were spinning around the star at speeds that would put a starfighter to shame.  She was surprised they were orbiting the star and not flying out into interstellar space.  They were certainly moving fast enough.  If she hadn’t detected them during the first voyage to the sphere, she would have wondered if the scavengers had somehow set them into motion.

Curious, she thought, recalling the Fists they’d seen inside Dyson Two.  Are they still being propelled on beams of pseudogravity?

“Captain,” Helen said.  “There are limits to how much we can learn at this distance.  I request permission to deploy a flight of sensor drones.”

Staci frowned.  Normally, the decision rested with her and her alone.  Now, there was an admiral on her ship ... and no way to know if the drones would anger a brooding alien presence, if indeed there was a presence.  She would have preferred to know, even if the Builders were disinclined to do anything more than order the intruders out of their system.  It felt as if she was in a foreign country, without any idea of what would anger the locals.  The slightest misstep could get her and the entire squadron killed.

“Launch the drones, but they are not to cross the debris shell,” she ordered, finally.  They’d made flights into the shell before, and the scavengers had presumably done the same, but they needed to be careful.  One ship – or even a handful of tiny ships – weren’t a squadron that included several light warships.  She doubted the Builders would feel threatened, any more than she’d be worried by a cannon pointed at her ship, but they might see it as a hostile move.  “And make sure they stay well away from any large pieces of debris.”

“Aye, Captain,” Helen said.

The display sparkled, then updated as the remainder of the squadron arrived.  Staci could just imagine the consternation on the command decks as they took in the sheer immensity of the sphere.  The squadron captains commanded vessels that included some of the most advanced in humanity’s fleets, but the spheres made them look like wooden sailing ships.  They’d seen the sensor records, of course, yet ... there was nothing like gazing upon the sensor displays with your own eyes to bring home just how huge – and alien – the spheres truly were.  Sure, one of them might have shattered.  It was still proof of technology beyond anything the human race could boast.

“The remainder of the squadron has arrived,” MacPhee noted.  “The tactical command network is coming online now.”

Staci nodded.  The drills had concentrated on establishing the command datanet as quickly as possible and they’d done well, once they’d ironed out the problems, but now ... her lips twitched as the network staggered into existence, dangerously slowly.  They’d have been in deep shit if they had jumped right into an ambush, part of her mind noted coldly; it was hard to believe the space navies had slipped so far since the war.  But then, the spheres did have a way of worming into your mind.  Some of her crew, during the first mission, had even insisted they were being watched.

And for all we know, we were, she reflected, as the last of the ships linked into the command network.  We just don’t have any way to be sure.

Her terminal bleeped.  “Captain,” Admiral Dismukes said.  His holographic head materialised next to her.  “You didn’t warn me nearly enough.”

Staci smiled.  “I think I ran out of superlatives to describe the spheres, sir,” she said.  “If it wasn’t for the recordings, my superiors would be trying to have me committed.”

The admiral laughed, rather humourlessly.  Staci understood.  The naval files hadn’t been that clear on Admiral Dismukes’ precise role – he certainly hadn’t been a front-line commanding officer or the navy would have known about him – but the briefing files had suggested he’d been in command of studying and duplicating alien technology.  The task before him was immense.  Staci doubted he’d be able to come to grips with it unless the researchers got very lucky.

“I can see their point,” he said.  “The squadron will hold position near the tramline for a couple of days, long enough for everyone to familiarise themselves with the sphere and see if there’s any response to our hails, then we’ll approach Dyson One and start chasing out the scavengers.”

“Understood,” Staci said.  She was fairly sure there’d be no response, but she understood the admiral’s point.  They had to do everything in their power to contact the Builders before assuming they were gone, dead or both.  “It would probably be wise to push probes closer to the debris shell.  We might be able to track the scavengers back to their hideouts.”

“Some of the shattered plates might even have an atmosphere,” the admiral agreed.  “Or so we were told.”

Staci suspected that was wishful thinking.  It might be theoretically possible – if you could give a Dyson Sphere a gravity field you could easily do the same to a planet-sized piece of debris – but they hadn’t detected any active gravity fields within the debris shell during their first mission.  The field within Dyson Two had at least been detectable, even if they hadn’t been able to locate the generators or work out how they functioned.  There’d been nothing comparable within the debris field.

Although we should inspect the shattered plates for gravity generators, she mused.  They have to be emplaced somewhere, assuming they survived the disaster ...

“We’ll check,” she said, neutrally.  Her earlier thoughts about the sheer size of the debris field came back to haunt her.  It might take years to be sure there wasn’t a habitable plate orbiting the star.  “Do you want to broadcast warnings to the scavengers?”

“Yes,” Admiral Dismukes said, bluntly.  “We should at least try to warn them off.”

Staci kept her thoughts to herself.  The Dyson Sphere was hardly human territory.  The Royal Navy couldn’t declare an exclusion zone and make it stick, at least not legally.  God knew the exclusion zone around Vesy was violated all the time, with far less at stake.  The Great Powers had done their best to legally exclude anyone who refused to join the united exploration team and share their findings, in exchange for access to everyone else’s findings, but the lure of a monopoly on advanced alien tech was irresistible.  It made her wonder if there were British ships in the debris field, deniable assets that could be thrown to the wolves if the shit hit the fan.  She’d been told no, but who knew?  Certainly not her. 

“Yes, Admiral,” she said.  There might be American ships out there too.  And French, Russian, Chinese, and God alone knew who else.  The Belters would definitely have sent ships, if she was any judge.  Of all the human societies, they were the ones most likely to want to build a sphere of their own.  “I’ll see to it now.”

The admiral nodded, then cut the link.  His head vanished.  Staci suspected it would be a while before anyone was ready to proceed.  She’d had problems, on the first mission, and they would have been worse if the ship hadn’t materialised within the debris field.  They’d come very close to striking a chunk of debris, something she’d honestly thought impossible outside a bad movie written by incompetent hacks.  The writers might have had the last laugh after all ...

“Captain,” Helen said.  “There was an odd little fluctuation within the tramline.”

Staci tensed.  “How do you mean?”

“The gravity pulses were longer than I’d expected, when the squadron made transit,” Helen said.  “I’m not sure what it means, but ... it was just odd.”

Jenner looked up.  “A flicker signal?  Or something like it?”

“Possibly,” Helen said.  “We don’t even know how the tramline was stretched.  Or created.  It could be a natural side effect, or something much worse.”

Staci frowned.  “Forward the data to the researchers, then keep an eye on it,” she ordered.  “There’s nothing else we can do.”

“Aye, Captain.”

Chapter Ten: HMS Endeavour, Dyson System (Exterior)

“It’s fantastic,” Admiral Dismukes said.

Charlotte nodded, curtly.  They stood together in the observation blister, peering towards the distant star.  It was ... striking.  The star should have been nothing more than a faint light in the distance, but instead it was a halo of light that reminded her of a galaxy, seen from a distance beyond human imagination.  She knew what she saw – the light from the star was reflected and refracted by the debris cloud – yet mere words could not do it justice.  The admiral, seeing it for the first time, seemed shaken.  She understood.  The raw numbers were nothing more than numbers, as soulless as a bureaucrat, but the reality was something else.  It was so impossibly vast that there was no way anyone could truly grasp the sheer scale until they laid eyes on it.

It’s the difference between planning to walk a few dozen miles and actually doing it, she thought, giving the admiral time to adjust to the new reality.  On paper, it looks easy; in practice, it’s a great deal harder.

Her lips quirked at the thought.  Some of humanity’s engineers were still in deep denial, practically insisting the spheres couldn’t possibly exist.  Others were coming up with hundreds of explanations involving technology so advanced it might as well be magic, from mining raw matter from a star to a working matter-energy-matter convertor ... the latter, from what she’d heard, so completely impossible it really did require magic.  She supposed they might well be right, although she knew what her ancestors would have thought if they’d laid eyes on a starship.  Neil Armstrong and the early pioneers of spaceflight would have dismissed Endeavour and her sisters as magic too.

“We’ll build something like it, one day,” the admiral commented, finally.  “And we’ll be more careful too.”

Charlotte shrugged.  The engineers – the ones who weren’t in denial – insisted the spheres were inherently unstable, that it was just a matter of time before Dyson Two shattered like Dyson One.  She didn’t pretend to have an opinion on the subject.  The Builders wouldn’t have gone to all the effort of constructing the two spheres, let alone crafting a complete biosphere suitable for intelligent life, if they hadn’t thought they could keep them intact.  And yet ... she raised her eyes, studying the halo once again.  Distance lent enchantment.  It was easy to believe, from such a distance, that the debris cloud was nothing more than another set of great rings, like the ones orbiting countless gas giants.  It was harder to recall that the sphere had once played host to countless billions – perhaps trillions – of intelligent beings, all of whom hadn’t had the slightest idea their world was vulnerable until it was far too late.

“I hope so,” she said, quietly.  “If there were primitive civilisations on the sphere, they couldn’t have hoped to save themselves when the sphere came apart.”

She felt chilled.  Natural disasters were vanishingly rare in Britain.  There were no tidal waves, no hurricanes, no earthquakes worth the mention.  The great waves that had battered the coastline during the First Interstellar War had been far from natural ... she’d been a child, back then, and she’d been safe even as thousands upon thousands of others fled their homes, never to return.  Their children had been a little more paranoid ... she shook her head, imagining what it must be like to live in a world without any real understanding of how it worked.  Natural disasters had been thought to be the wrath of the gods.  How else could they be explained?  And the poor bastards living in the sphere hadn’t known anything about their world.  One moment, everything had been fine; the next, the land had cracked and shattered and they’d all been swept into space.

If there was a population, she thought, grimly.  It was a slender hope, but she clung to it anyway.  They might have only settled Dyson Two.  Or moved the population from Dyson One to Two when disaster threatened.

The admiral glanced at her.  “The reports didn’t do it justice, did they?”

“No.”  Charlotte knew it all too well.  “The reports were just ... words.  This is reality.”

She kept her face under tight control.  It was easy to produce any sort of special effects a movie producer might wish, easy – too – to churn out deepfakes to embarrass or implicate the target in front of their audience.  The Dyson Spheres could have easily been envisaged in great detail by any number of scriptwriters, then given life by their crew of experts ... she scowled, inwardly.  There was something about the halo in front of her, beautiful and awe-inspiring and very much a tomb, that defied any number of FX crews.  It was like meeting an alien for the first time.  They were real in a way no man in make-up or CGI animation could hope to match.

The admiral’s wristcom bleeped.  “It’s time,” he said.  “Are you coming?”

Charlotte nodded, then followed the admiral through the hatch and into a maze of corridors.  She’d had more time to explore the ship’s interior, during the voyage, but it still managed to confuse her.  She didn’t understand how Thomas – her former husband – had coped.  The survey ship was huge, by starship standards, and yet it felt confining and claustrophobic.  The bulkheads felt as if they were looming over her, threatening to close up and crush her at a moment’s notice.  She supposed it had something to do with the simple fact she couldn’t stop the ship and get off.  Back home, there’d always been the opportunity to go into the garden for a spot of fresh air.  Here ...

She stepped aside to allow a pair of crewmen to hurry past, pushing a heavily laden cart down the corridor.  She had no idea what they were doing, or where they stood on the chain of command, but at least they had something to do.  Perhaps that was how Thomas had coped.  He’d been assured of command from the moment he entered the academy – given his birth, he’d have had to screw up spectacularly to be denied his shot at the command chair – and he’d been a good officer.  He’d once complained to her there was never any shortage of things that had to be done, just to keep the ship running.  He’d never really been able to sit back, relax, and indulge himself.  She, on the other hand, had very little to do.

At least once I finished reading all the personnel files, she reflected, as she followed the admiral into the conference chamber. No one would have noticed – or cared – if I’d spent the entire voyage in a VR suite.

The admiral’s steward poured two mugs of coffee, then withdrew as the first holographic presences snapped into existence.  They looked blurry, an effect that always made her smile.  There were no technical issues with projecting holograms so perfect that they could have passed for the real thing, at least until one touched them, but communications holoprojectors were designed to project images that were clearly nothing more than holograms.  She had no idea why, unless it was to make it clear the person wasn’t really there.  It struck her as faintly absurd.  It wasn’t as if someone could hack a dedicated processor, not without the owner’s consent ...

Although it might not be completely impossible, she thought, as the captains, diplomats and researchers flickered into view.  As technology advances, the technology to hack it advances too.

Admiral Dismukes tapped the table.  Charlotte straightened and looked from face to face.  The great advantage of holoconferences was that you could fit hundreds of people in a space meant for few, although the holograms tended to fall into the background when the person wasn’t actually speaking.  Icons flickered up in front of her, confirming that the datalinks were as secure as human tech could make them.  She wondered, suddenly, if the Builders were listening, reading the signals as casually as GCHQ would read the signals from a bygone age.  It seemed improbable, but who could tell?  The Dyson Spheres were pretty improbable too.

“We saw the recordings,” Admiral Dismukes said.  His voice was carefully bland.  “They did not come close to matching the reality.  Even from this distance, we cannot deny the sheer scale of the spheres – and the technological prowess of the race that built them.”

He let his words hang in the air for a long moment, then continued.  “Commander Willis?”

Commander Steven Willis seemed to step forward, his hologram swelling until it dominated the chamber.  “Endeavour left ten sensor platforms behind to monitor the system when she returned to Earth,” he said.  His voice was clipped, precise; his face unreadable.  “Seven platforms have responded to our hails and uploaded their records, which were hastily analysed by my department.  The remaining three platforms remain unaccounted for.  They may have suffered catastrophic failure, or they may have been deliberately disabled or destroyed.”

“You do know how to sugar-coat a shit sandwich,” Captain Lewis commented.  “If they were destroyed, who by?”

“Good question,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “The Builders?  Or the scavengers?”

“We don’t know,” Willis said.  “The sensor platforms are not prone to failure, and the odds of three of them failing at the same time are very low, but this system is alarmingly cluttered.  It’s quite possible they were struck by orbiting debris and destroyed ...”

“Or blasted out of existence by some unimaginable piece of alien tech,” Captain Lewis said, grimly.  “How could the scavengers find the platforms?”

“We don’t know,” Willis repeated.  “The surviving platforms recorded no changes within the system, at least outside the intact sphere, until the first scavengers started appearing a couple of months ago.  My team believes they actually arrived earlier, but took precautions – at first – to hide, either from us or the Builders.  They certainly didn’t sweep the system for sensor platforms, unless they have some tech that isn’t even on the drawing board.”

“Quite,” Admiral Dismukes agreed.  “Are there no signs of Builder activity?”

“Nothing, as far as we can tell,” Willis said.  If he was irked at having to effectively repeat himself, he didn’t show it.  “Dyson Two remains quiet.  The platforms near the tramline picked up nothing, although it should be noted that one of the silent platforms was positioned near Endeavour’s transit point when she jumped out of the sphere.”

Captain Lewis snorted.  “Coincidence?”

“It could be,” Professor Mike Mansion said.  “The debris field is much thicker there.”

Charlotte nodded.  Endeavour had had to slip inside the debris field to reach the tramline, something that would have been considered absurd almost anywhere else.  She still felt cold, when she considered how many things could have gone wrong.  If they’d materialised too close to the surface, they would have crash-landed ... if they hadn’t been vaporised by the orbital defences.  She recalled hearing a rumour that Captain Templeton had been threatened with a court-martial for taking the risk, although she didn’t know if the story was true.  The government would be unwise to prosecute a war hero for an act most of the population would applaud. 

She leaned back in her chair and listened, saying nothing, as the researchers ran through their preliminary findings.  There was nothing beyond what she already knew, from the last voyage, save for the arrival of scavengers.  Dyson One was a dead world – a dead sphere – and there was no way to tell what was waiting to be found.  A shiver ran down her spine as she recalled some of the darker suggestions, from rogue nanotech to reality-warping machines that might as well be magic wands.  The scavengers had to be stopped.  If one party – a nation, a corporation, an independent community – got its hands on super-tech, it would lead rapidly and inevitably to war.

“I believe we can proceed,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “Unless anyone has any objections, I’ll make the formal announcement of an exclusion zone after this meeting and then we can commence our explorations of the ruins.”

“I think we should proceed immediately to Dyson Two,” Mansion said.  “There may be technological discoveries waiting for us within the ruins, Admiral, but I wouldn’t care to bet on when and where we’ll find them.  The majority of the scavengers might have headed straight for Dyson Two.”

Admiral Dismukes raised his eyebrows.  “You think so?”

“There’s no inherent reason the scavengers can’t jump into the sphere, just like we did,” Mansion pointed out, dryly.  “They want samples of working alien tech, sir, and they know where it can be found.  The risk is immense, and difficult to calculate, but so are the rewards.”

Charlotte had to concede the researcher had a point.  The scavengers could hardly have doubted there would be a multinational mission to the spheres, one organised at breakneck speed.  They’d need to hurry if they wanted something they could sell before the flotilla arrived and started chasing them out of the system.  If they had jumped into the sphere ... she cringed, inwardly.  The Builders hadn’t noticed Endeavour, as far as anyone could tell, but their automated defences had been dangerous enough.  What had happened to any scavengers who’d taken the risk?  Or ... had they somehow sneaked around the defences and recovered something of real value?

“We’ll do what we can to secure the debris first,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “Once that’s accomplished, we’ll start preparing to jump into Dyson Two.”

He paused.  “Does anyone have any other suggestions?”

Charlotte waited, wondering if anyone would answer.  The planning had been done – back on Earth, as well as during the voyage – but seeing the sphere had unsettled everyone.  It was quite possible – probable, even – that the research team would come up with new ideas for exploring the rubble or tricking the alien defences into letting them get further into the sphere.  Or that the idea of offering the scavengers amnesty in exchange for joining the team should be discarded ...

“I’ll make the broadcast now,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “We’ll have to wait a day or two before beginning operations.”

“We’ll have to be very polite,” Admiral He commented.  “We still don’t know who rules this system.”

“True,” Charlotte agreed.  “But surely they should have noticed something.”

Mansion made a humourless sound.  “Would you notice an ant crawling around your feet?”

Charlotte shrugged.  She understood the thinking – a race capable of building the spheres might not even notice a primitive raft like Endeavour – but she found it hard to believe.  A poisonous spider was no less poisonous because of its lack of intelligence, nor was it incapable of hurting an unwary human.  Besides, a starship was hardly natural.  The Builders should have registered Endeavour’s presence, even if she did look like a log canoe compared to a modern warship.  Who knew?  Thomas had once told her a primitive starship could do a hell of a lot of damage to a modern vessel, if it had the advantage of surprise ...

“We don’t know who exercises effective control over this system,” Admiral He pointed out, coldly.  “Nor do we know if the Builders agree with our concept of effective control and ownership.”

“We have done everything we can to attract attention,” Mansion snapped.  “We have bombarded the system with radio waves, communications lasers, gravity pulses ... everything we could think of, in a bid to get them to notice us.  We ran through the whole First Contact protocol, inside and outside the spheres, and a number of protocols that were devised by Endeavour’s crew during the last mission.  There was no response.  Surely, if they were watching and objected to our presence, they’d have ordered us to leave.”

He leaned forward, bullishly trying to convince them to believe.  “The Builders are gone.  I don’t know why, but they’re gone.  All that’s left is a mystery we have to solve as quickly as possible, before whatever happened to the Builders happens to us.”

“International law states that the system’s controlling power does have to order intruders out before they start shooting,” Admiral He said.  “But the Builders might have different ideas about how such things work.”

Charlotte nodded, slowly.  The basic concept of legal ownership of territory rested on one’s ability to assert authority within the territory.  It was a little more complex than that, she’d been assured, but that was the basic idea.  If you tolerated someone else setting up shop within your territory, particularly if you didn’t assert your authority over them, your authority would be diluted and eventually fade into insignificance.  By human law, the system had been legally abandoned and could be claimed ...

But the Builders might have a different idea of how law works, she thought.  And the people with the biggest guns are the ones who get to set the rules.

“We cannot allow unsupervised scavengers to sift through the system in search of alien technology,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “Nor can we risk them provoking an interplanetary incident with a race so advanced they can dismantle dozens of planets to produce a pair of Dyson Spheres.  And if the Builders do show up to tell us to get lost, we can at least try to talk to them.”

“If they actually listen,” Admiral He said.  “We don’t have the power to make them listen.”

“It’s hard to believe they wouldn’t recognise us as an intelligent race,” Charlotte countered.  “Starships are not built by unintelligent animals.”

“Humans have a poor track record, when more advanced cultures meet their inferiors,” Admiral He countered.  “Some see their inferiors as ripe for conquest.  Others think they have to take up the white man’s burden and uplift the poor savages, somehow making sure they’re still the ones in charge.  Somehow, the savages never reach the top, no matter how much they embrace the more advanced culture.  The Builders might do more harm through good intentions than malice.”

“Perhaps,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “If they make their presence known, we will change our plans.  Until then, we must proceed on the assumption the system is no longer under their supervision.”

And hope to hell he’s right, Charlotte thought.  If they do show themselves, everything will change.

Chapter Eleven: Shuttlecraft IV, Dyson System (Exterior)

“This is weird,” Tobias said.  “I mean ... it’s like something out of a game!”

“Take a hard left and we’ll lose them in the asteroids,” Marigold agreed.  “Zip left, zip right, skim over the surface of one asteroid and dart between two more, while the enemy starfighters crash into the rocks and their starship gets smashed when it tries to follow you through the gap.”

Tobias had to laugh.  It had been something of a disappointment, when he’d started his unconventional naval career, to discover that zipping through the asteroid belts only happened in movies.  He knew he should be relieved – the idea of flying through an asteroid field was terrifying – but it still felt as though he was missing out on something.  The debris field ahead of him, by contrast, was so crowded he really was picking his way through an obstacle course.  There were sections he had to slow the shuttle and crawl through the gaps and others that were so cramped he dared not take the shuttle anywhere near them.  A man in a suit might survive, but a shuttle?  The idea of taking Endeavour through the field was absurd.

“The debris isn’t even predictable,” he said, although that wasn’t completely true.  “We could hit something at any moment.”

He scowled under his breath.  The debris field had hundreds of plates that were larger than Britain – some were large enough to have a tiny gravity field – but the majority of the pieces were relatively small ... relatively.  The chunk directly ahead of the shuttle was two hundred kilometres from end to end, tumbling through space like a club thrown by a barbarian warrior.  Some seemed to be in relatively stable orbits, leisurely circling the star; others were orbiting so rapidly it wasn’t clear why they hadn’t been blasted out into interstellar space long ago.  Tobias wasn’t cleared for any of the really high-level speculation, but he’d heard through the grapevine that some of the researchers believed the Builders had acted to stabilise the wreckage when they’d failed to save the shattered sphere.  It would certainly explain why Dyson Two wasn’t covered in scars from falling debris ...

And the sphere would have certainly attracted more than its fair share of debris, he mused.  Dyson Two didn’t have much of a gravity field – it was a shell, not a solid construction – but it was a very big target and alarmingly close to the shattered sphere.  The star trapped within the shell would have drawn debris into its gravity well, slamming it into the sphere.  They must have done something or one sphere’s destruction would have killed the other.

A console bleeped.  “Ah,” Marigold said.  “I have something.”

Tobias felt his heart start to race.  “An intruder?”

“An energy pulse,” Marigold said.  “I’m copying the data to the system interlinks now.”

“Got it.”  Tobias keyed his console, readying the shuttle.  “Anything?”

Marigold shook her head, never taking her eyes off the display.  Tobias grimaced. The system was supposed to be dead, but the sheer volume of debris orbiting the star made for a very murky environment indeed.  Solar flickers were redirected, energy pulses were scattered, random radio transmissions were twisted and warped ... all, as far as he could tell, without anyone screwing with their minds.  The researchers had gotten very excited when they’d picked up a transmission a few days ago, only to discover that the signal had originated far from the sphere ... and might not even be a product of intelligent life.  Tobias smiled.  If listening aliens picked up half the crap humanity had churned out, since the television had been invented over two hundred years ago, they might assume there was no intelligent life on Earth either.

Or declare war, he thought.  He’d read a bunch of novels with that plotline, during the long flight from Earth to Dyson One.  Who could blame them?

He kept his face under tight control as he glanced back into the rear compartment.  Colin and his four marines were sitting against the bulkheads, looking entirely composed as they waited for something to happen.  Two were reading datapads, while the others looked to be trying to sleep ... Tobias felt a flicker of envy, mingled with the grim awareness the marines would have the harder task by far if the sensor contact proved to be a scavenger vessel.  The admiral’s broadcast – giving the scavengers a flat choice between quitting the system or joining the mission – had been sent out two days ago, but there’d been no takers.  Tobias wasn’t surprised.  The stakes were too high for any of the scavengers to willingly leave the system.

Which means we have to make them, he reflected.  And that means ...

“Hah!”  Marigold glanced up.  “One ship, trying to sneak away from us.  Vector ...”

Tobias keyed his console.  A low hum echoed through the shuttle as the drives powered up.  He heard the marines snapping to alertness behind him, bracing themselves for action.  The shuttle quivered, then darted forward, passing within bare kilometres of a piece of debris.  Tobias wondered, suddenly, if starfighter pilots would be competing for the chance to fly through the debris.  It was just the sort of thing they’d do, even if it was banned.  Particularly if it was banned.

“They’re picking up speed themselves,” Marigold said.  “They saw us coming.”

“Too bad.”  Tobias doubted the mystery ship could escape.  Unless she had some kind of drive system he’d never heard of, the shuttle had the edge.  “Do we have an ID?”

“Power curves suggest a modified freighter,” Marigold said.  “Definitely human, thankfully.  The warbook can’t be any more specific.”

Tobias nodded, stiffly.  He’d read countless books where interstellar wars had begun after one ship panicked and fired on the other.  They had legal authority to stop any human ship nosing through the debris field without permission, but alien ...?  He had the nasty feeling he and the rest of the crew, even the passengers in the rear, would be scapegoated if the shit really did hit the fan.  It would be hard to blame the government.  The last war had pushed the human race to the brink of extinction, not just defeat.  Better to surrender a bunch of scapegoats than risk another war.  Even a local conflict, something akin to the Anglo-Indian War, would be disastrous.

He put the thought out of his mind as the shuttle picked up speed.  The intruder wasn’t sticking around to talk.  She was heading straight for the tramline – her only real hope of escape – and using the debris field as cover.  It wasn’t enough.  Tobias ran the calculations in his head, then checked them against the computer projections.  The unknown ship couldn’t hope to outrun them.  She’d either have to open fire when the shuttle hove into range or try to stall long enough to reach the tramline and escape.

“Signal from Endeavour,” Marigold said.  “They’re dispatching reinforcements.”

Tobias snorted.  The shuttles and gunboats might be fast, but there was no way in hell they’d arrive in time to be helpful.  The distance was just too great.  No, they were on their own.  He gritted his teeth as their flight paths continued to converge, trying to overhaul the unknown ship.  Her commander wasn’t fool enough to try to evade them.  Tobias hoped that was a good sign.  If she was armed, she might just be waiting for him to get close – very close – before she blew him away.

“Stand by point defence,” he ordered.  “If they open fire, engage at will.”

“Aye, sir,” Marigold said.

Tobias felt sweat prickling on his back.  It had been a great deal easier during the war.  The virus never surrendered and rarely broke contact, even when defeat was certain.  The universe had been divided into friendlies and hostiles and it had been easy to tell which was which.  Now?  His rules of engagement were a little vague, when it came to exactly how much opportunity he had to give the other ship to slow down and be boarded before he opened fire ... raising the spectre of an enemy CO targeting the shuttle with a laser weapon, then blasting the shuttle before he knew he was under attack.  There would be no warning.  And the shuttle wasn’t heavily armoured ...

“I’ve got a solid lock now,” Marigold said.  “Asimov-class freighter.  Possibly from the Belt.”

“Possibly,” Tobias agreed, although there was no way to be sure.  The Asimov-class design had been thrown together by a multinational consortium, then sold to everyone with the cash to buy them.  He couldn’t think of a single nation or corporation that didn’t use such freighters.  “Send the signal?”

“Yeah,” Marigold agreed.

Tobias keyed his console.  “Unknown starship.  By the authority vested in Multinational Task Force Clarke, you are ordered to shut down your drives and prepare to be boarded.  I say again, you are ordered to shut down your drives and prepare to be boarded.  If you refuse to comply, we are authorised to take all necessary measures to force you.  You have five minutes to respond.”

Colin moved up behind him.  “Any response?”

“None.”  Tobias tried to keep his voice stable.  “Of course, we won’t see a laser beam until it hits us.”

“They’d be fools to open fire,” Colin said.  He sounded strikingly jovial, for a man who was a passenger on a very obvious target.  “We’d blow them away.”

Tobias snorted.  “Laser beams travel at the speed of light,” he said, verbalising his earlier thoughts.  “The first warning we’ll have is when the beam hits us.  And if they take us out, they can get across the tramline and escape before our reinforcements arrive.”

He leaned closer, studying the projected vectors.  They didn’t know what they were facing.  Asimov-class vessels were designed for easy reconfiguring, allowing them to serve as everything from bulk freighters to passenger liners and private transports for the immensely wealthy.  They made poor warships, compared to purpose-built ships, but a number had been converted into escort carriers or even makeshift warships over the last few years.  The ship in front of them was probably armed, at least with a pair of popguns.  The old rules about not arming civilian ships had fallen by the wayside, when the universe had turned out to be a great deal more hostile than everyone had thought.

The console bleeped.  “That’s five minutes,” he said.  “They didn’t reply.”

“I’ll prep for a combat leap,” Colin said.  “See if you can get them to see reason.”

Tobias keyed his console again.  “Unknown ship, this is your last warning.  Heave to or we will open fire.”

He braced himself.  His shuttle was designed for military deployments, but he was uneasily aware she was very lightly armoured indeed.  They were just too close for comfort if the enemy vessel opened fire.  His hand hovered over the firing key, ready to unleash a spread of torpedoes and plasma fire.  The enemy might already have them zeroed in, silently counting down the seconds.  If they opened fire ...

The console bleeped.  “You have no authority here,” a voice said, so atonal he knew it was being run through a machine.  “You have no right to impede us in our lawful business.”

Tobias tapped the console, transmitting the admiral’s signal package.  “Heave to and prepare to be boarded, or be fired upon,” he said.  “This is your last warning.”

“Hey,” Colin said.  “Isn’t that their second last warning?”

Tobias ignored him.  It would be easy – very easy – if the unknown ship opened fire.  They could legally return fire and no one would complain if they turned the ship into a ball of superheated plasma.  There’d be some grumbling from the intelligence staff, he was sure, who’d be deprived of a chance to trace the ship back to her owners, but Captain Templeton would have his back.  She’d been a frigate officer.  She knew how important it was to end a fight as quickly as possible.  But if the unknown ship refused to heave to, he’d have to decide between firing on her or letting her go.  Either one could easily lead to some very bad consequences indeed.

The console bleeped.  The unknown ship was cutting her drives.

“We will comply, under protest,” the atonal voice said.  A beacon appeared on the display.  “Please proceed to the forward hatch.”

Tobias glanced at Colin.  “It looks as though you won’t have to make that leap after all.”

Colin snorted.  “Better luck next time, right?”

***

Colin glanced at the rest of the half-platoon, then led the way through the airlock as soon as the hatches mated.  He’d been more nervous about the prospect of a combat leap than he cared to admit, not when the enemy ship could either have picked the incoming marines off in transit or simply altered course and sworn blind they hadn’t seen the marines, nor that they'd intentionally left the marines floating in interplanetary space.  It would have been a neat tactic, forcing Tobias to decide between saving the marines and chasing the freighter all the way to the tramline.  Colin doubted it would work as effectively as the bad guys might have hoped, but who knew?

The inner hatch hissed open.  A wave of warm air washed across his nostrils, bringing with it the unmistakable stench of a crew on long-term deployment.  The freighter might have been extensively refitted for deep-space operations, but there were limits ... he kept his face under tight control as he stepped through the hatch and saw the commanding officer waiting for him.  He looked Chinese.  Colin felt his heart sink.  The man’s features proved nothing – the Chinese Diaspora had reached the stars – but his naval reservist’s uniform was deeply worrying.  Colin had no idea if the Chinese had stolen-valour laws, forbidding civilians from wearing uniforms they hadn’t earned ... no, it didn’t matter.  No one would wear such a gaudy uniform on a daily basis, certainly not on deployment, unless they had no choice.

“I am Captain Tsing, Chinese Navy Reserve,” the officer said.  His English was surprisingly accented.  “You are committing an act of aggression against ...”

Colin cut him off.  “The Chinese Government contributed ships and personnel to the multinational force and signed off on its mandate,” he said.  “Your presence here is illegal by the laws of your own country, let alone anyone else.  We will therefore take your ship and crew to the fleet, where you will be held pending a final decision regarding your future.”

Captain Tsing showed no visible reaction.  “This is piracy.”

“Your government signed off on our mandate,” Colin reminded him.  He lowered his voice gently.  “Look.  The diplomats will sort this out, if we give them a chance.  Let us do our duty and take you and your crew to the flagship, then no one needs to get hurt and I’ll put in my report that you cooperated.”

The Chinese officer scowled.  “I have had no orders from my government,” he said, “but I acknowledge your threat of force.  Accordingly, we will cooperate under protest on the condition that we be allowed to communicate with my government’s representatives as quickly as possible.”

“You’re in luck,” Colin said.  “There’s an admiral in the fleet, and a small diplomatic staff.”

He met the captain’s eyes.  “Now, please ask your crew to assemble in the wardroom.  Once we search your ship, we can get underway.”

Captain Tsing made no further protest.  Colin frowned inwardly.  It was rare for a starship captain to let himself be pushed around so easily, particularly when he’d been caught doing something illicit.  If the Chinese Government had sent the freighter to the system ... he considered the possibilities for a moment, then shook his head.  It was light years above his pay grade.  The diplomats could sort everything out, once they took possession of the ship and crew.  His job was to make sure the freighter was searched and secured before something else happened.

He left two marines to watch the crew, then led the others in a hasty search of the vessel.  She was an asteroid mining ship, reconfigured with additional storage space and survey tools.  It wasn’t a bad choice, if one wanted to poke through the debris field in search of advanced technology.  She’d even recovered a handful of pieces of alien junk.  Colin took a bunch of photographs and forwarded them to the fleet, then made his way back to the bridge.  It was ... odd.  It took him several moments of staring to realise what was wrong.  The freighter was a civilian design, but the bridge was decidedly military.

Interesting, he mused.  He’d seen a pair of covert-insertion ships that looked exactly like civilian craft, although they’d barely been used during the war.  They’d looked quite military on the inside too.  Where are her papers?

He poked around the bridge until he found the IAU registry chip and plugged it into a reader.  The ship – oddly, she had no official name; just a corporate number – was registered to a state-owned mining corporation, rather than an independent corporation or shipper.  There wasn’t much else, not even a flight log ... something that was technically illegal, if the Chinese Government found out.  Or ... he wondered, suddenly, if the ship’s datacore had been switched out before she’d allowed herself to be boarded.  Captain Tsing was very definitely a military officer ...

“Whatever,” he said.  The intelligence staff would have to come poke through the ship before she was handed over to the Chinese authorities or simply reassigned to the MNF.  It was well above his pay grade.  The whole affair was going to turn into a political nightmare.  He’d have to keep his head down and hope for the best.  “The diplomats can sort it out.”

Chapter Twelve: HMS Endeavour, Dyson System (Exterior)

Charlotte groaned as she finished reading the report.

She’d expected there would be problems, as the MNF moved to intercept and arrest scavengers and smugglers, but she hadn’t expected anything that might turn into a major diplomatic incident or an outright war.  She felt like the little girl who’d gone fishing for minnows, only to discover she’d caught a shark.  A Chinese ship ... it could easily lead to real trouble, a diplomatic incident that would tear the alliance apart before the MNF could even start probing the sphere itself.  It wasn’t as if it was a simple corporate-owned ship either, one acting against the interests of its government.  In China, the corporations were effectively owned and controlled by the state and served its interests.

And that means they won’t dare go against their own government, she thought, as she leaned back in her chair.  They wouldn’t be here without the government’s approval. 

The thought was irksome.  There were British corporations that wouldn’t think twice about defying the government’s best interests if they thought they could make a profit, but the Chinese corporatists didn’t have anything like so much latitude.  The system was hardly transparent to outsiders – the tangled web of patronage was so opaque it made the Old Boys Network look simple – yet it was clear high officials passed between the government and the corporations so often they might as well be one and the same.  Charlotte liked to think she was an old hand at scoping out the hidden web of power and influence that was largely invisible to the general public, and identifying who could pull strings on her behalf, but the Chinese system was incredibly confusing.  It made her wonder if it was intentional.  Anyone not born within the system would have the hardest time manipulating it in their favour.

She put the thought aside as she looked at the report again.  The Chinese ship had been searched from top to bottom, revealing a number of alien artefacts and a pair of deep-frozen alien bodies.  The datacores had been bland to the point of uselessness; the analysts had noted, coldly, that there was so little data it was almost certain the ship had been operating under military or intelligence protocols.  The crew might have been reasonably cooperative, but ... it was clear they were military.  Charlotte rubbed her forehead as the door bleeped, then straightened before keying the switch.  Admiral Dismukes nodded politely as he stepped into her office.

“Ambassador,” he said.  “Are you ready?”

Charlotte nodded, feeling uncomfortably naked though she was fully dressed.  She knew how to handle someone from her own background who’d transgressed against social norms – like herself, part of her mind pointed out unhelpfully – but this was different.  The Chinese had to be rebuked, yet – at the same time – they couldn’t be alienated.  The alliance would come apart at the seams if the Chinese backed out, forcing the other powers to decide between war to keep the Chinese away from the spheres or allowing a free-for-all, with everyone sending ships of their own to the system to search for alien artefacts.  It would require a very delicate touch.  The Chinese could not be backed into a corner or they’d come out shooting.

Perhaps literally, she thought.  International politics were a lot like High Society.  A person of wealth, power and influence had more latitude for misbehaviour than a person who could be cut out of one’s social circle without consequence.  She knew men who’d gotten away with atrocities and women who’d been excluded for minor social missteps, mistakes they hadn’t even known were mistakes.  It was astonishing what people would overlook if drawing attention to it would rebound negatively on them.  The Chinese are just too powerful to ignore.

“Let me do the talking,” she said.  The Chinese had diplomatic agents of their own accompanying the fleet.  One of them would handle the discussions, ensuring he could take the blame if something went wrong.  She felt a stab of fellow-feeling for her counterpart.  She was in the same boat.  If she fucked up ... she glanced at the datapad, at the long list of suggestions put forward by diplomatic aides who wouldn’t be blamed if things went to hell, then keyed her terminal.  “I can take the blame.”

The admiral smiled, although there was little real humour in the expression.  “I think there’ll be enough blame for everyone, if the alliance comes apart.”

Charlotte nodded, her heart starting to race.  She had no illusions about how quickly the government would disown her.  She understood their thinking, even agreed.  But would it be enough?  There were some mistakes that couldn’t be buried by any amount of scapegoating, gods that couldn’t be placated by human sacrifice.  If she fucked up ... she composed herself, recalling how she’d been stranded on the surface only a few short months ago.  She’d survived, barely.  She could survive this too.

If nothing else, I could release the usual volume of largely fictitious memoirs and retire on the proceeds, she reflected.  The scandal sheets would love me.

She braced herself as the secure datalink opened, then blinked in surprise as Admiral He materialised in front of her.  The Admiral ... she’d expected a low-level diplomat, someone who could be thrown under the shuttlecraft if the discussions went badly.  Admiral He wasn’t a diplomat ... was he?  He had to be pretty well connected if he’d reached flag rank – MI6’s file had suggested he was closely related to several of China’s ruling families, although it was impossible to be sure – and he really wasn’t the sort of person who could be discarded on a whim.  Probably.  Charlotte knew she couldn’t abandon her children to their fate because they were politically inconvenient ...

“Admiral,” she said, schooling her face into a mask.  Perhaps the Chinese meant to surprise her, to keep her off balance.  They’d twisted the normal rules and turned them on their head.  “Thank you for coming.”

Admiral He nodded, politely.  “I’m sorry it took so long,” he said, as if he’d been personally responsible for the delay.  “My staff have finished interrogating the corporate crew.”

Charlotte felt a stab of ... something.  There’d been no way to keep from handing the prisoners over to the Chinese, not when holding them could easily have led to a far greater diplomatic incident.  The Chinese were a member of the alliance in good standing ... officially, at least.  Their personnel could not be held without consequence.  She had no idea if she’d handed them over to people who would protect them or torture them.  The Chinese Government, like most governments, seemed to believe that certain things were only wrong if you got caught. 

“That’s good to hear,” she said, carefully.  She could be more direct – and sharper – with a diplomatic functionary.  “Might I ask what they said?”

Admiral He sounded faintly embarrassed.  “They were dispatched to the sphere as soon as Haikou returned to Sol,” he said.  “Their corporate masters believed they could get an edge by moving at once, rather than waiting for a more formal exploration party.  They left the system well before any international agreements were put together, vetoing private exploration missions.  I have reviewed their statements and find them plausible.”

And I can believe as much or little of that as I like, Charlotte thought.  The hell of it was that it was plausible.  There had been a brief gap between Endeavour and Haikou’s return to Sol and the international agreement to explore the spheres jointly, just long enough for a corporation to dispatch a ship or two and swear blind they hadn’t meant to defy the global alliance.  Would they really risk dispatching a ship without approval from their governmental superiors?

Admiral Dismukes leaned forward.  “Did they not check in with the flicker network before leaving explored and colonised space?”

“Their orders were to reach the spheres as quickly as possible,” Admiral He said. “Their least-time transit course kept them away from much of the network, or made it awkward to pause long enough to check for orders.  They certainly had no reason to think there was any need to contact Earth.  We did propagate the agreement through the network as soon as it was made, but ...”

He shrugged, expressively.  “Captain Tsing and his crew did not intend to violate the agreement, as it hadn’t been made when they left Sol.  Their reluctance to let themselves be boarded is explicable, if unfortunate, and they will be soundly rebuked for that when they return home.”

Charlotte cocked her head.  “And what is their explanation?”

“Their corporate masters are ... disinclined to allow their ships to be boarded, after the ... incident between us and the Americans before the First Interstellar War,” Admiral He said, easily.  “They had standing orders, in fact, to disallow boarding if at all possible.  The only reason they conceded was because they couldn’t hope to evade long enough to make it out before being forced to halt.”

Admiral Dismukes snorted.  “Were they planning to take the artefacts home and report them?”

“I have no doubt they would have been reported to the proper authorities,” Admiral He said, calmly.  “Please rest assured this was an unfortunate incident springing from corporate overenthusiasm and long-standing protocols devised well before any international alliance against alien powers – or the discovery of the sphere itself.  Right now, the artefacts and the bodies are with the research teams, while the crew will be returned to Earth to face their superiors as soon as possible.  As a gesture of goodwill, I have vetoed their demand we file charges against your shuttle pilots and marines.”

“That’s good to hear,” Charlotte said.  She doubted Admiral He was being completely honest.  His story was plausible – and she was old enough to know real life was often stranger than any novel, with chains of improbable events that would make Wodehouse or Christie blush – but she didn’t buy it.  Not completely.  Was he covering for the government official who’d authorised the mission?  Or was he just trying to bury it as quickly as possible?  “Do you think there are other Chinese ships within the debris field?”

“You mean, unsanctioned ships?”  Admiral He met her eyes.  “To the best of my knowledge, there are none.  But I knew nothing about the corporate ship until we stumbled across it.  I will broadcast messages across the system, ordering any other ships to report to me at once, but ... I do not know if they will answer.”

The stakes are too high, Charlotte thought.  She wouldn’t be too surprised to hear that the Chinese government had dispatched a secret mission – and that the admiral had been kept in the dark.  What he didn’t know, he couldn’t tell.  What are we really dealing with here?

Admiral Dismukes cleared his throat.  “What’ll happen to the ship’s crew?”

“My superiors will decide their fate,” Admiral He said, flatly.  “The ship herself will remain here and you will have full access to her datacores, as well as the artefacts she collected before she was caught.  On behalf of my nation, please accept my apologies for this unfortunate incident.”

And you hope we can all put it behind us, Charlotte added, silently.  It was rare for a government to concede the point so quickly, particularly when it meant admitting to an embarrassing problem.  Even if the Chinese Government didn’t have the slightest idea the survey ship had been sent to the sphere, it would still be awkward.  At the very least, they’d have to admit they knew nothing ... and they’d be all too aware they probably wouldn’t be believed.  What are you really playing at, Admiral?

Her mind raced.  The admiral might think other nations had sent their own ships to the spheres.  He might expect to be let off lightly, on the unspoken understanding he’d do the same if – when – someone else was caught bending or breaking the rules.  It was a good point, too.  Charlotte knew nothing about secret British missions, but she wouldn’t care to swear an oath there were none.  Coming down hard on the Chinese now might rebound on her late, if there were secret missions ...

“I gratefully accept your apologies,” Admiral Dismukes said.  Charlotte heard a hint of sarcasm in his tone and wondered if Admiral He heard it too.  “My survey teams would like to ... discuss the matter with your crew, to determine where they found the artefacts.”

“They may send messages, which will be answered,” Admiral He said.  “Unfortunately, I cannot hand them over to you.  The Omega Seven incident is still fresh in our minds.”

Charlotte groaned inwardly.  The Omega Seven incident – a clash between America and China in a virgin star system that had come very close to outright war – was hotly disputed, with both sides insisting the other was the aggressor.  There was no clear consensus on precisely what had happened, even after nearly a hundred years of contact and conflict with various alien races, and it had poisoned relationships between the two powers to the point they’d been reluctant to bury the hatchet when the first alien war began.

And Admiral He has no latitude at all, when it comes to handing over Chinese personnel, she thought, grimly.  His superiors will skin him alive if he surrenders anyone to us, no matter the cause.

Admiral Dismukes said nothing for a long moment, then shrugged.  “Very well,” he said.  “For the moment, we will close the matter here.  Our governments may have other ideas, but it will be quite some time before we hear from them.”

“Unfortunately so,” Admiral He agreed.  “Ambassador?”

Charlotte nodded, shortly.  “I’m sure this will not impede our working relationship,” she said, although she felt no such thing.  “And it would be my pleasure to invite you to dinner later in the week.”

Admiral He nodded, although he probably suspected she wanted a chance to talk to him off the record.  His superiors would be reviewing all his official correspondence and discussions, including recordings of their holoconferences.  Even the dinner parties wouldn’t be completely private, despite her best efforts.  It was just like holding a formal gathering back home.

“I’m sure we’ll be talking again soon,” Admiral He said, finally.  He nodded, once again, then reached for an invisible terminal.  “Good day.”

His image vanished.  Charlotte let out a breath she hadn’t realised she was holding.  The incident could have turned nasty, really nasty.  Admiral He had been surprisingly calm about the whole affair ... suspiciously calm.  Her thoughts churned, spinning in circles.  The Chinese Government hadn’t been caught red-handed – they had enough deniability to avoid that – but they were still implicated.  They should have been more pushy, more arrogant, more demanding ...

“Odd,” she said, out loud.  “That went easier than I expected.”

Admiral Dismukes glanced at her.  “In what way?”

“Governments need to save face,” Charlotte said.  It really was like High Society.  You could be caught doing something inappropriate, or even outrightly criminal, and as long as you had wealth and power you could get away with it.  Or convince people to give you wriggle room ... to put you under house arrest, rather than jail.  “The Chinese Government might or might not have authorised the mission, but the fact the mission took place is embarrassing enough even if they didn’t.  He should have made a much bigger fuss.”

“He isn’t a diplomat,” Admiral Dismukes pointed out.  “He may see no point in playing out a losing hand.”

“This isn’t a card game,” Charlotte countered.  She’d attended games where the stakes had been high, including a handful of quasi-legal games with illicit stakes, but none involving billions of lives.  What sort of lunatic would gamble with their entire country at stake?  “The stakes are much higher.  He should have ...”

She shook her head.  “He might be gambling on another nation being caught too, which isn’t impossible, and expecting us to act in our own best interests by letting the Chinese slip away ...”

“That sounds a little too complex,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “Why bother?”

Charlotte met his eyes.  “China is an interstellar superpower.  She took heavy losses in the war, but so did the rest of us.  She has a powerful military, as well as an industrial base fully the equal of ours.  She is a major geopolitical player in East Asia and an interstellar power, with a government that has no qualms about throwing its weight around to get and keep whatever it wants.  She cannot be ignored, no matter how much we might wish to pretend she doesn’t exist.  Even if she really is caught red-handed, she has enough clout to make us look the other way ... if she uses it.  Why didn’t she?”

“Perhaps she saw it as pointless,” Admiral Dismukes offered.  “A scrabble here and now won’t help them in the long run.”

“Nor will an admission of guilt, or even incompetence,” Charlotte said.  “At the very least, someone has blundered.  The Chinese would no doubt prefer to deal with them in private, while confusing the issue as much as possible.  And yet, they just backed down.”

“This is the most important mission in human history,” Admiral Dismukes said.  It wasn’t an exaggeration.  “They dare not let themselves be pushed out of the system,”

“They can’t be pushed out,” Charlotte said.  “Not unless we want a shooting war.  They know it, too.”

“If you’re right ...”  Admiral Dismukes said nothing for a long moment.  “What are they doing?”

“I don’t know,” Charlotte admitted.  It was possible that Admiral He, a bona fide warfighting admiral, had decided there was no point in fighting a losing battle.  Or that he thought his connections were strong enough to keep him from facing punishment for not fighting such a battle.  “But out of character behaviour is always indicative of something.”

Chapter Thirteen: HMS Endeavour, Dyson System (Exterior)

The body was alien.  Very alien.

Staci stood by the transparent casing and stared down at the frozen corpse.  It was ... difficult, somehow, to make out any details, as if there was something so fundamentally wrong with the body that her mind refused to grasp what her eyes saw.  The body seemed humanoid, but so insectoid that she couldn’t help thinking it had more in common with a grasshopper than the average human.  Her imagination filled in the details ... a giant praying mantis, perhaps, with limbs and motions that were very inhuman indeed.  She tried not to shudder.  It was rare for humans and aliens to co-exist, outside the various diplomatic posts.  It was just too disconcerting.

“We’ve never seen anything like him,” Doctor Casey Hodgkin said.  The dark-skinned xenospecialist stood next to Staci, her eyes alight with the fire of a researcher on the verge of making discoveries in a whole new field.  “He’s from a completely new species.”

“I figured,” Staci said.  “No matches at all?”

“None.”  Casey didn’t look up.  “No matching genetic links to any known race, including the Virus and its zombie servants.  It’s hard to be sure, Captain, but there are no hints of any genetic modifications or implanted tech.  I’d say this fellow’s ancestors were brought to the sphere by the Builders and left to live or die there.”

Staci shivered and tried to hide it.  “Can you be sure?”

“No, because we lack a baseline for the species,” Casey said, flatly.  “However, the products of evolution tend to be a little more ... slapdash than the products of genetic engineering.  Also often more adaptable.  This body doesn’t show any telltale signs, as far as we can tell, nor are there any hints he spent his life in an industrial civilisation.  No contaminants in his blood, for example.”

She glanced at Staci.  “I think we can be fairly sure this fellow wasn’t a Builder.”

“Understood,” Staci said.  “Where did he come from?”

“His species?  We don’t know.”  Casey picked up a datapad and held it out.  “Realistically, we may never know.  His ancestors could have inhabited one of the worlds the Builders dismantled for raw materials, or discovered nuclear weapons and blown themselves up, or been overwhelmed by the Virus, or evolved into beings of pure energy and flown into the higher realms.  Who knows?”

Staci nodded.  “Good work,” she said.  “I look forward to your full report.”

She took one last look at the alien corpse – it was hard to keep her face from showing her discomfort as ice ran down her spine – then turned and made her way out of the compartment, passing through the biological checkpoints one by one.  She’d thought herself used to boredom – it wasn’t as if she was in danger of running out of things to do, from reports that needed to be read to crew training and disciplinary matters – but the weeks of inactivity were starting to gnaw at her.  The excitement of chasing scavengers out of the system had been replaced by weeks of nothing, the military personnel watching and waiting for something to happen while the researchers poked and prodded their way through the shattered sphere.  Any hopes of stumbling across the Key To It All had faded as the sheer size of the debris field impressed itself upon minds that had refused to accept the truth until they saw it with their naked eyes, until it could no longer be denied.  She sighed inwardly as she headed through the corridors, torn between the wish for something to happen and fear of just what might happen.  She would almost sooner be on patrol in the remnants of infected space.

Her wristcom bleeped.  “Captain,” Charlotte’s voice said.  “Could you join me in my suite?”

Staci frowned inwardly, then shrugged.  “I’m on my way,” she said.  Her XO was on the bridge and would remain so for another hour.  They’d put together a plan to ensure her junior officers had a chance to get some bridge experience themselves, but Staci had been reluctant to sign off on it.  There was no way to even guess at what might happen if the researchers stumbled across something best left buried.  “I’ll be there in a moment.”

She made her way through the hatches, past a marine guard who was almost certainly wasting his time and stepped into the diplomatic suite.  The compartment was both large and cramped, the handful of cots placed against the bulkhead a grim reminder of just how many people had been crammed onto her ship.  She was uneasily aware of just what would happen if another ship ran into trouble and they had to take her crew off in a hurry.  Military ships were over-engineered, but there were limits.  Her life support was closer to the red line than any spacer would normally tolerate.

We’re lucky they’re putting together an orbital habitat now, she thought.  We might be able to offload half our passengers shortly.

Charlotte waved to her as she stepped into the inner compartment.  The diplomat was sitting next to Admiral Dismukes, who threw her a jaunty salute, and a solar researcher Staci had met briefly – during one of the innumerable gatherings Charlotte had thrown to break the ice – and promptly forgotten.  Dale?  David?  She kicked herself, mentally, for forgetting the name.  Mitch Campbell had had a gift for remembering people and making them feel important.  It was one she knew she should develop, too.

“Captain,” Charlotte said.  “Professor O’Kelly found something interesting.”

“David is one of the theoretical solarformers,” Admiral Dismukes added.  “You might find it very interesting indeed.”

Staci wondered, as she took her seat, what sort of diplomatic game they were playing.  She was the flag captain, technically, but she didn’t need to know everything.  Her role was commanding her ship and assisting the admiral to command the flotilla, not serve as an aide.  A discovery that didn’t impinge on the flotilla’s safety was one she could read about later, in the formal reports.  But Charlotte had asked for her personally ...

Professor O’Kelly cleared his throat.  “Perhaps I should give some background first,” he said, carefully.  His tone suggested he wasn’t used to talking to people.  “Terraforming is the art of altering a planet’s biosphere so it can support unprotected human life.  Solarforming is the art of altering a star’s inner configuration so it can give light and life to an Earth-class world.  It is, of course, purely theoretical.”

“Of course,” Staci murmured.

“The problems are immense,” Professor O’Kelly continued.  “Stars are, at base, giant nuclear power plants.  That is, of course, hugely simplified, but it does help to get the idea across.  In theory, a large infusion of raw materials – the right kind of materials – could reshape the star’s inner configuration, reigniting a dying star or shifting a red dwarf into a perfectly normal and serviceable G2 star.  In theory – also in theory – heightening a star’s gravity field would also lead to the development of more tramlines, linking our star to others nearby.”

“In theory,” Admiral Dismukes echoed.  “There were proposals to craft immensely powerful gravity generators that would cause a star to either collapse in on itself, eventually becoming a black hole, or simply explode.  None of those proposals ever got off the drawing board.”

Professor O’Kelly learned forward.  “The practical problems appeared to be insurmountable.  Supplying a star with enough raw material to make a real difference would be very difficult.  We would need a planet-sized mass of hydrogen, for example, and getting it streamed into the star would be ... also difficult.  The whole concept was put on the back burner, like many other concepts that are theoretically possible and technically impossible.  However ... I have reason to believe the Builders figured out how to do it.”

Staci’s eyes narrowed.  “What do you mean?”

“The early reports from your first mission suggested the two Dyson primaries were both perfectly normal G2 stars,” Professor O’Kelly explained.  “That was a little odd.  Binary systems are not unknown, of course, but it’s rare for both stars to match.  In fact, given how much debris there is orbiting Dyson One, I would have expected plenty to have fallen into the star and given it additional mass.  My research however, suggests there was almost no increase in mass at all.”

“But ...”  Staci felt as if she was out of her depth.  “Wouldn’t the debris have vaporised on contact?”

“There’d still be atoms falling into the star,” Professor O’Kelly said.  “And the material that makes up the outer shell is tough, perhaps tough enough to survive falling into the star.  The point is, however, the star is suspiciously regular.  There are no sunspots, no flares, nothing save for a steady burning glow.  I think the Builders took the star they found and solarformed it into a G2.”

Staci stared at him.  “They reshaped an entire star?”

“So it seems,” Professor O’Kelly said.  “They may also have used the gravity well to create the extended tramline.”

“It does link to Dyson One,” Admiral Dismukes agreed.  “What is odder is that the only tramline leading to Dyson Two is the one linking it to Dyson One.  There appear to be no other tramlines leading into the intact sphere.”

“Interesting,” Staci said.  It made little sense.  Most G2 stars had at least two tramlines.  “How?”

“My guess is that the Builders used focused gravity beams to direct streams of raw material into the star, then push and shove the star’s innards until they were in the right configuration,” Professor O’Kelly said.  “My computer models suggest it should be possible.”

Staci stared down at her hands, feeling like a boxer who’d just lost four rounds in quick succession and was seriously considering not bothering to get up.  The spheres were giant megastructures, engineering projects that were comprehensible even though they were on an immense scale, but altering a star ... she found it hard to grasp the sheer hubris of a race that had tinkered with an entire star, risking total disaster just so they could build a pair of Dyson Spheres ...

“Are you sure?”  She understood how to fight a battle.  This was beyond her.  “If they could reignite a star ... what else can they do?”

“Good question,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “It’s quite possible they accidentally doomed Dyson One, if they were focusing gravity beams through the sphere.  The computer models suggest there might have been gravimetric distortions, tiny in isolation but putting ever-growing stress on the sphere until it shattered.  Once the cascade began, the sphere’s collapse would have become inevitable.”

“Jesus,” Staci breathed.

Admiral Dismukes exchanged an unreadable look with Charlotte, then glanced at Professor O’Kelly.  “Thank you for your time, Professor,” he said.  “We’ll catch up with you later.”

“This is vitally important,” Professor O’Kelly said.  “Sol will not go supernova, not without intervention, but it will balloon into a red giant within the next five billion years.  When that happens, Earth will probably be caught within the expanded plasma and rendered uninhabitable even if the planet itself survives.  This tech, if we could master it, could save ...”

“Thank you, Professor,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “That will be all.”

He waited for the professor to leave the compartment, then smiled.  “Five billion years, give or take a few million,” he said.  “I dare say we have time to evacuate the planet by then.”

“If we’re still around,” Charlotte said.  “What’ll we become in a mere million years?”

Staci frowned, inwardly.  Logically, humanity could not have been amongst the first intelligent races.  There was no reason to think intelligent life was a relatively new development ... hell, the spheres were clear proof intelligence had been around for millions of years.  But if that was the case, where were they?  Humanity’s expansion into interstellar space had slowed, after first contact and a succession of bloody wars, but it hadn’t stopped.  Logically, the first intelligent race to sweep across the stars should have precluded everyone else. 

But if that is true, she asked herself, where are they?

“That is not our concern right now,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “We’ve been here for two months.  We’ve found very little.  True, we’ve barely scratched the surface when it comes to exploring the wreckage.  But there’s no reason to think we’ll stumble across anything more in the next few weeks, or months, or years.  Do you think any differently?”

“No, sir,” Staci said.  “The artefacts we’ve found appear to be ... uninformative.”

“Yes.”  Admiral Dismukes met her eyes.  “So far, we have refrained from returning to Dyson Two.  That may be about to change.”

Staci frowned.  “It may?”

Charlotte looked down at her hands.  “The council wants to jump into the sphere again,” she said, curtly.  “Some think we need to make certain there are no scavengers poking through the sphere and selling guns to the natives, others think it may be our only chance of recovering pieces of working alien tech.  There are some voices that think we should watch and wait and continue to try to hail the Builders, but they are in the minority.  The simple fact we have no idea when we’ll find something worthwhile out here, if indeed we ever will, makes it impossible to slow the demand for more intrusive probes.”

“I see,” Staci said.

“As my flag captain, and the commanding officer of the first starship to enter the sphere, I want your opinion,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “Should we risk the jump?”

Staci hesitated.  She was good at judging risks in combat – and good at improvising, if her original plan didn’t survive contact with the enemy.  But she understood combat.  The sphere ... she recalled the first jump, the first exploration missions, and shivered.  The sphere’s interior had been dangerously unpredictable.  She certainly wasn’t convinced their intrusion hadn’t been noticed.  And yet, entering the sphere might be the only way to start unravelling the mysteries before they ran out of time.

If we’re on a timetable, she thought, numbly.  Are we?

The thought mocked her.  The mission couldn’t keep coming up with nothing.  Raw speculation about how the megastructures had been built, and the stars reshaped to suit alien plans, were interesting, but hardly useful.  Not now, at least.  The governments wanted something soon, something that would compensate for the expenditure of sending so many ships so far from home.  The gravity-manipulation tech alone would pay for everything ...

... But only if its secrets could be unravelled and the tech could be put into mass production.

“I have no reason to think the sphere’s interior is any more dangerous than it was previously,” she said, carefully.  “We don’t know if they reacted to our departure ... we don’t know if there is any intelligence guarding the sphere, although our analysts think the defences were effectively automatic, designed to react to potential threats rather than take the initiative.  They attacked any radio transmitters without discrimination, for example, but didn’t try to track the transmitters when they were powered down.  Nor did they bother to make certain the shuttlecraft they shot down was actually destroyed.”

She took a breath.  “But I could be wrong.  There’s just no way to be sure, short of taking the plunge.”

“And jumping into the sphere,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “The discussions are still going on, but I think the outcome has become inevitable.  If we don’t turn up something new and interesting within the week, we’ll be hopping into the sphere.  This time, at least, we have a better idea of what awaits us on the far side.”

Staci nodded.  The First Space Lord, Admiral Onarina, had publicly commended her decision to risk jumping into the sphere, but – in private – she’d been scathing.  There’d been no way to know what awaited them and their best guesses, drawn from studying the wreckage of Dyson One, really had been nothing more than guesses.  Staci had insisted it had been a calculated risk – and she knew she’d do it again – yet there’d been too many imponderables.  If Endeavour had materialised inside something – the sphere’s shell, a mountain, the star, a mobile defence platform – the results would have been disastrous.  It might have killed everyone living in the sphere, perhaps even cracked the shell ...

“I think we have no choice,” she said, finally.  The mission was well supported now, but how long would that last?  There were so many demands on the government’s resources that it might think twice about the mission, if the researchers kept drawing blanks.  She was well aware of the importance of raw data, and theoretical possibilities, but it didn’t always lead to workable hardware.  “There’s no guarantee of finding anything within the ruins.”

“Yeah,” Admiral Dismukes said.  He took a breath.  “We’ll send two destroyers in first, under strict radio silence.  No transmissions, nothing to draw attention.  If the region is clear, we’ll jump half the flotilla into the sphere and begin our studies.  If not ... we may have to back off and see if we can find another way through the shell.”

“There is a hatch,” Staci said, as if hatch was a suitable word for an airlock big enough to allow the entire navy to pass through simultaneously.  The word seemed to diminish the reality somehow, to make it something she could comprehend ... something that seemed almost within reach.  “If we can get it open ...”

“If,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “It would be much easier if the Builders showed themselves, wouldn’t it?”

“Perhaps,” Staci said.  Her life had taught her to think it was better to seek forgiveness than permission, although her mother would probably have disagreed.  “But they might just tell us to go away.”

“At least we’d know they didn’t want us around,” Admiral Dismukes said.  The frustration in his voice was all too clear.  “This way, we remain uncertain until we commit ourselves.”

“And everyone wants answers, and quickly,” Charlotte added.  “God alone knows what they’ll do if they don’t get them.”

Chapter Fourteen: HMS Endeavour, Dyson System (Interior)

“Now hear this,” Jenner said.  “All hands prepare for transit.  I say again, all hands prepare for transit.”

Staci kept her face under tight control as the flotilla prepared to jump.  Last time, they hadn’t known what to expect when they’d jumped into the sphere.  This time ... they’d brought everything they thought they’d need, from primitive tools and probes that might go unnoticed by alien defences to sensor platforms so advanced they could track gravity pulses from halfway across a star system.  Half the ship’s research crews had been transferred to the ships that would remain outside, replaced by a multinational team prepped to explore the sphere’s interior.  Staci couldn’t help a tight smile at the thought.  The sphere was so vast it would take hundreds of years to explore even a tiny fraction of the interior.

And all the political pressure to find something – anything – we can use to justify the mission may wind up being pointless, if we can’t even find a place to start, she reflected.  There’s no guarantee the sphere will reveal its secrets in a hurry.

Jenner turned to face her.  “Captain,” he said.  “All ships report ready for transit.  Admiral Dismukes has passed squadron command to Admiral He.”

Staci nodded, curtly.  She hadn’t been privy to much of the high-ranking arguments over who’d go into the sphere and who’d remain outside, waiting for the squadron to send a courier back to update them, but she had a feeling they didn’t matter.  Endeavour had been the first ship to find and jump into the sphere and no one could take that from them, not now.  Everyone knew the name of the first man to set foot on the moon, but not the names of the men who’d set up the first mining colonies and turned the moon into a good place to live.  But ... she supposed it was political.  If the mission discovered the equivalent of the holy grail, everyone wanted a share of the credit.

And if we unleash a threat to the entire galaxy, her mind whispered, everyone will be doing their best to pretend they weren’t even remotely involved.

“Communications, raise Daring,” she ordered.  “Confirm she is ready to jump.”

“Aye, Captain,” MacPhee said.  There was a brief pause, just long enough to worry her.  “Daring confirms, Captain.  She’s ready.”

“Inform the admiral,” Staci ordered.  “And begin the countdown.”

She felt a twinge of guilt as her eyes lingered on the simple light code representing Daring.  Cold logic told her the destroyer was expendable – she could certainly be replaced quicker than Endeavour or one of the logistics vessels – but Staci still felt conflicted about allowing the tiny ship to go first.  Part of her wanted to take the lead, part of her understood they had to be careful.  Anything could have happened inside the sphere, anything at all ... she wondered, not for the first time, what they’d do if Daring never returned.  Try again?  Try to open the polar hatch?  Or back off and continue surveying Dyson One until the politicians tired of the lack of results and pulled the plug?  She didn’t envy Admiral Dismukes.  He’d have to make the call ...

“The admiral confirms, Captain,” MacPhee said.  “Daring will jump in five ... four ... three ... two ... one ...”

The light code vanished.  Staci took a breath and held it.  Destroyer jump drives were designed for hasty regeneration, to allow them to jump back if they ran into something they couldn’t handle, but it still took time for the nodes to repower.  Perhaps it would have been wiser to send a bigger ship or refit a freighter with two jump drives and enough fusion cores to make two transits in quick succession ... an idea, she reflected sourly, which would have made little sense anywhere else.  It was difficult, almost impossible, to predict when and where an enemy might make a jump along a tramline.  But not here.  The Builders wouldn’t need hyper-tech to keep a sharp eye on the tramline inside the sphere ...

“Ten seconds,” McDougall said.  The tactical officer sounded strikingly calm.  “Fifteen seconds ...”

What’s happening over there?  Staci didn’t bother to say it out loud.  No one could answer.  If she doesn’t come back at all, what’ll we do?

The light code flashed back into existence.  Staci didn’t relax.  The datanet was already interrogating Daring, computers scanning the live feed from the destroyer to make certain she hadn’t been compromised in some way.  The virus had taken over human ships and used them to mount sneak attacks, although it had never been able to keep up the pretence for very long.  Who knew what the Builders could do?  Staci had read some of the more far-out speculations and rolled her eyes, wondering just what the researchers though the human race could do if they ran up against a near-omnipotent race?  It would be hopeless ...

“The codes check out, Captain,” MacPhee reported.  “Local space inside the sphere is clear.  No sign of anything moving to intercept us.”

She was only there for twenty seconds, Staci thought.  FTL transmissions were possible – and the Builders probably had near-instant transmissions right across the sphere, even though such feats were beyond humanity – but twenty seconds was hardly long enough for anyone to notice the destroyer, let alone do something about it.  If we were watching, the destroyer would have been and gone before we realised she’d ever been there at all.

The terminal bleeped.  “Captain,” Admiral Dismukes said, his holographic face materialising beside her.  “I believe we are clear to jump.”

Staci nodded, glancing at the display.  The interior of the sphere was every bit as awe-inspiring – and terrifying – as she remembered.  “Yes, sir,” she said, shortly.  “Do I have your permission to begin the countdown?”

“Granted,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “See you on the far side.”

His image vanished.  Staci allowed herself another tight smile.  The admiral might be in command of the mission, but right now he was just a passenger, unable to do more than issue the most general orders and rely on his staff to carry them out.  If they ran into trouble ... she understood, suddenly, why Captain Hammond had been so reluctant to accept a promotion that would have inevitably taken him out of the command chair, even though it would probably have saved his marriage.  He might get high rank and a higher salary, but it would take away the pleasure of command ...

And all the responsibilities as well, she thought.  He won’t be the one facing a board of inquiry if a ship doesn’t make it home.

She leaned forward.  “Helm, are we ready to jump?”

“Yes, Captain,” Atkinson said.  “Puller drive online, ready to jump; standard drives powered up, ready to come online.”

“All sensors and weapons ready, Captain,” McDougall added.  “Weapons held.  I say again, weapons held.”

“Do not fire without my express command,” Staci said, as if he didn’t know it. The last thing anyone wanted was to accidentally start a war with a super-race.  “Communications, begin the countdown.”

“Aye, Captain,” MacPhee said.  “Jump in ten ... five ... one ...”

Staci braced herself, her heart beating like a drum as the universe sneezed.  The world seemed to go dim for a second, as if she were trapped in a dream – or a nightmare – before everything snapped back into place.  The display blanked, then hastily rebooted.  She sucked in her breath as the sphere’s walls – the shell – appeared on the display, unable to avoid a moment of pure claustrophobia even though she knew there was enough room within the sphere for every planet humanity had ever settled.  More and more icons appeared in front of her, noting energy sources orbiting the lone world or patrolling the outer edge of the atmosphere.  It was hard to be sure, but it looked as if there were more Fists on patrol.

“Captain, all ships made it through,” MacPhee reported.  “The command datalink is coming online now.”

“Deploy passive sensor platforms,” Staci ordered.  Active sensors would probably draw attention from the automated defences – and radio waves certainly would – but they could learn a great deal from passive sensors.  Who knew?  Perhaps they’d track down an alien command centre or something else, something of equal value.  “Tactical, keep an eye out for anything that might be taking an interest in us.”

“Aye, Captain,” McDougall said.

Staci nodded, curtly.  Assuming the Builder sensors weren’t FTL – an assumption she suspected to be dangerous – it would be several minutes before they noted Endeavour’s arrival.  Perhaps.  They might be capable of monitoring the tramline for ships passing through it, detecting faint traces of gravity fluctuations, or ... who knew?  She would have been happier if she did know, one way or the other.  It was easy to calculate when a human sensor platform would pick up the first traces of their presence, but an alien device of unknown capabilities?  Their speculations didn’t even rise to the level of guesswork.

She kept the thought to herself as more and more data flowed into the display.  There were a handful of alien objects moving around the system, their missions as inexplicable as their power sources.  She thought one of them was making its way to the north mountain, to the hatch that led out of the sphere, but it was hard to be sure.  Some were dawdling – she had the sudden mental image of an alien dragging its feet, delaying the moment of arrival – and others were rushing around at velocities she would have thought impossible, if not dangerous beyond belief.  No starship humanity had ever produced could travel at 0.5C, let alone close to the speed of light itself, and if they had no one would have allowed them to push their engines so hard within a sphere.  And yet, the Builders did it casually ...

And if they can hurl objects at us at such speeds, we’ll barely have seconds to realise they’re coming and react before it’s too late, she thought.  If they didn’t use powerful gravity beams to shove them around the system, we wouldn’t be able to see them coming at all.

“Captain,” McDougall said.  “None of the fists appear to have noticed us.  However, two are orbiting the north mountain, where we sent the buggy down to recover the stranded team.”

Staci frowned.  “Are they trying to block us from sending more teams to the ground?”

“Possibly,” McDougall said.  “We don’t have any solid idea of what transpired inside the sphere after we jumped out.”

“Or who else might have jumped in,” Jenner said.  “Sensors, are you detecting any other human craft within the sphere?”

“No, sir,” Helen Yang said.  “But any human ship that had access to our preliminary reports would understand the dangers of using active sensors within the sphere.”

“And if they didn’t, they’d learn very quickly,” Staci commented.  “Can you pick up any debris?”

“No, Captain,” Helen said.  “Not with passive sensors, anyway.  We could deploy a drone and have it run an active sensor sweep.”

Staci considered it.  Endeavour had come far too close to being smashed by a fist, when she’d first jumped into the sphere.  The scavengers might not have been so lucky, particularly if they hadn’t had a chance to read the reports before setting out to the sphere.  It wasn’t impossible.  No one with half a brain would assume the Great Powers would refuse to send missions, either together or individually, to explore the alien ruins.  The scavengers would have a very short window of opportunity before the official mission arrived.  They’d know better than to waste it.  And yet ... if they had been smashed, there’d be little hope of recovering anything worth the risk.  The fists would come after anything broadcasting active sensor pulses.

And they might not stop after they silence the sensor, she thought, grimly.  For all we know, they’re more alert now.

“Hold that thought,” she said, finally.  “We’ll keep it in reserve for now.”

Jenner glanced at her.  “It still seems odd, doesn’t it?  Why do they attack radio transmitters and active sensor platforms on sight?”

Staci had wondered about that herself, as had the analysts.  It seemed absurd to think the local populations could get into space, not given their tech limitations and restraints.  Anyone broadcasting in orbit – or whatever one called the sphere’s interior – had to be an outside visitor, a newcomer to the system.  Did the Builders assume that everyone who entered without permission was hostile?  Or that no one would enter without permission?  Or ... that they were the only species to develop high tech and no one else would ever match them?  She had no idea.  Alien mindsets were difficult to follow at the best of times.

“They may assume that no one would jump into the sphere without permission,” she said, finally.  “Or that they never expected the system to be abandoned and never bothered to make any preparations for the day.”

“If the system is abandoned,” Jenner countered.  “We’ve barely scratched the surface of the sphere.”

Staci nodded.  “The admiral will decide how to proceed,” she said.  “For the moment, we can only watch and wait.”

***

“I keep expecting to see stars,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “It feels ... eerie.”

Charlotte couldn’t disagree.  The sphere was just too big.  A mansion, a starship, even a giant space colony, was understandable – she could wrap her head around their dimensions – but the sphere ... it was immense, too big to be truly grasped.  She understood, suddenly, why so many people had believed the world to be flat, long after it had been proven to be a sphere.  It was just too big ...

She shook her head.  “Years ago, I watched a movie where the kids were accidentally shrunk until they were the same size as insects,” she said.  “The world they understood was suddenly huge and terrifying.  I know how they felt now.”

The admiral didn’t respond.  Charlotte understood.  The sphere was huge.  It felt as if they’d fallen into a piece of clockwork, designed and constructed on an immense – and unbelievable – scale.  They could try to understand the sphere, they could try to shape their impressions of the giant megastructure into something within their comprehension, but ... she reached out and squeezed the admiral’s hand.  The sphere’s sheer presence had taken a toll on the crew, last time.  She’d heard a handful of officers and men had requested reassignment or discharge after they’d returned home.  One had even wound up in a mental hospital.  And they’d had their duties to keep them focused.  She dreaded to think what might happen to anyone who didn’t.

You mean, like yourself?  The thought refused to go away.  What role do you have, when everyone is playing nicely and the Builders are absent?

Admiral Dismukes straightened, then recovered his hand.  “We’ll proceed as planned,” he said.  “The mission to the north mountain will be risky – of that I have no doubt – but it is still the best place to start.  We can test the new evasive tactics as well as examining the hatch itself.”

Charlotte nodded, shortly, as he led the way back to the CIC.  The ship hadn’t changed – of course not – and yet it felt subtly different, weirdly fragile.  The bulkheads felt confining, the ceiling felt as if it was squashing them ... she had the uneasy sense she was being watched, as if unseen eyes were following her ... she hoped, prayed, it was her imagination.  The sphere was so ... so different ... that it lent itself to all kinds of flights of fancy.  And yet ... her skin crawled constantly, no matter how much she told herself she was being fanciful.  She just didn’t feel safe.

“There’s been no visible reaction from the sphere’s defenders,” Commander Steven Willis said, once they were in the compartment.  A large hologram hung over the table, showing the sphere’s interior.  It was already crowded with icons and light codes representing the course and speed of a hundred different objects, but Charlotte knew it represented a tiny percentage of the whole.  “If they’ve noticed our arrival, they’ve not bothered to respond.”

“Why should they?”  Charlotte took a certain pleasure in appearing more composed than the rest of the admiral’s staff.  The military staff seemed a little overwhelmed, the researchers were either stunned or determined to start poking around the sphere as quickly as possible.  But then, she had seen the sphere before.  “We’re no threat to them.”

“But they attacked all radio transmissions without hesitation,” Mansion said.  “Why?”

Charlotte scowled.  She didn’t like the implications.  How else would a starship on a first contact mission open communications?  Firing on a ship that came in peace would guarantee the next ship would be a great deal less friendly.  But ... she wondered, again, if the Builders had originally assumed any visitors wouldn’t try to jump inside the sphere itself,  not without permission.  Perhaps there’d been a checkpoint outside, a few million years ago.  The fists might be nothing more than an automated security system, left in place when its master had gone onwards.  Careless, but hardly inexplicable.

“We will remain under strict radio silence, for the moment,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “We can gather considerable amounts of data without using active sensors, or risking a flight close to the lone world.  Later, when we know more, we’ll take that risk.”

“Later,” Charlotte echoed.  Last time, she’d insisted on flying to the sphere’s surface ... and nearly died there.  This time, she’d be a little more careful.  “We have time, don’t we?”

“For the moment,” the admiral said.  “But we do need to produce something before our masters have second thoughts.”

“We have already learnt some things worth knowing,” Mansion pointed out.  “The limits of the possible, for example.  The rest will come in time.”

“Agreed,” Charlotte agreed.  “But how much time?”

Chapter Fifteen: North Mountain, Dyson System (Interior)

“I should have had my head examined,” Tobias muttered, as he ran through the final set of pre-flight checks.  “Who was it who said, never volunteer?”

“You, just now,” Marigold said.  She didn’t look up from her own checks.  “And you were bored.”

Tobias snorted, torn between congratulating himself on his own bravery and kicking himself for being a complete idiot.  The last time he’d flown a shuttle anywhere near the shell, they’d been shot down and trapped on the surface.  He’d found himself wondering if they’d spend the rest of their lives down there, trapped with people he didn’t trust and a native population that had turned against them with terrifying speed.  And now, instead of keeping his mouth shut when the captain had asked for volunteers, he’d opened his gob and landed himself in hot water.  He couldn’t help thinking he’d made a terrible mistake.

“I should have stayed a coward,” he muttered.  “It was easier when I knew myself to be a coward.”

Marigold gave him a sardonic look.  “Was it?”

“No,” Tobias conceded, after a long pause.  He knew he’d been a coward.  Cowardice had been battered into him.  And he’d hated it, hated the fear that was a constant presence and the shame that accompanied it.  Hell, the only reason he’d been able to fly gunboats in combat was that he’d learnt to disassociate his mind from the reality of what he’d been doing, treating it as a demented game that could be reset – or abandoned – at any moment.  “But ... you know what I mean.”

“Maybe,” Marigold said.  “But you did volunteer for the mission.”

Tobias scowled.  The mission briefing had been very simple.  Take a shuttle to the north mountain, sneak past the fists and fly down to the hatch and ... and what?  The orders had gotten a little vague at the point, as if the people putting them together hadn’t known what to expect.  They probably hadn’t.  Tobias knew, all too well, that risking a drone anywhere near the fists was asking for trouble.  And yet, surely, an automated system could have handled the operation without risking human lives.

“I’m a bloody fool,” he said, as he took his seat and brought the drives online.  “What’s your excuse?”

“I’m a bloody fool too,” Marigold said.  “Aren’t you the slightest bit excited?”

“Ask me afterwards,” Tobias said.  It was hard to escape the sense Death Herself was standing behind his chair, waiting patiently to take him.  Funny, really.  He’d had far fewer problems flying gunboats, even though the enemy had been shooting at him.  “I’ll be excited when we get back home.”

The shuttle hummed as the drives powered up, the sensor console coming online and displaying their flight path to the north mountain.  It felt ... wrong, as if it was both too tiny to take seriously and too big to grasp, as if ... he’d looked at a map and decided it would only take an hour to walk from John O’Groats to Land’s End, or from Florida to California.  Or ... he wasn’t sure how to put it into words.  It would take hours to reach their destination and yet ...

Funny, really, he thought.  We tell ourselves Mars is right next to Earth, and on a cosmic scale that’s true, but it still takes time to get from one to the other.  And yet it can take less time to get to Terra Nova than Mars.

He sighed, inwardly.  The scientists had made all sorts of bird-brained requests, some requiring the crew to do things that would draw enemy attention and others that simply couldn’t be done with the technology on hand.  They seemed to think the impossible was somehow doable, at least when the impossibilities were outside their field.  It wasn’t that they were stupid, merely ignorant.  And yet ... he shook his head.  They’d just have to learn to cope with reality.  The fact the shuttle would need hours to reach its destination, even on a least-time course, was something that couldn’t be ignored.

“We’re cleared to depart,” Marigold said.  “Captain Templeton just sent us a personal good luck message.”

Tobias nodded, keying his console.  The flight was going to be long hours of boredom, followed by moments of screaming terror ... unless they got very unlucky and ran straight into a fist.  He’d seen the sensor reports – there were no active fists between the flotilla and the north mountain – but that was meaningless.  There might be an entire fleet of inactive fists in position, ready to come online at a moment’s notice.  He thought they’d get some warning, but ... who knew?  The sphere was a dangerously alien – and unpredictable – environment.  They might be flying straight into a trap.

“Disengage the airlocks,” he ordered.  The gravity field flickered as the shuttle separated itself from Endeavour.  “Here we go ...”

His heart started to race as he steered the shuttle away from the mothership and out into the sphere.  Space felt both open and yet confining, the sphere’s shell – a wash of blues and greens on a scale that messed with his head – a mocking reminder of how countless people had been transported to the sphere and trapped on the surface.  Tobias knew, all too well, just what had happened to people like him, in the days before modern technology.  The Builders, for whatever reason, had condemned countless millions to remain stagnated and trapped for the rest of eternity.  They might be great designers and builders – the twin spheres were proof of that – but they were also assholes.  What sort of monster traps people in hell?

Us, the nasty part of his mind pointed out.  We sink boats fleeing North Africa, don’t we?

The thought mocked him as they set course for the mountain and picked up speed.  The fists didn’t seem to respond to drive fields, at least until they got too close, something that puzzled him even as they took full advantage of it.  They should be able to detect them from right across the sphere ...  perhaps.  It wasn’t as if the drive fields were a perfect match for the gravity waves the Builders used to move their fists across the interior ...

He glanced at Marigold.  “It’s a pity ...”

“Yeah,” she said.  She knew what he meant, even though he hadn’t finished the sentence.  “But ... you know.”

Tobias nodded, curtly.  They were being monitored.  The entire mission was being recorded, from every last byte of data collected by the sensors to their medical conditions.  It would have been neat to put the craft on autopilot and spend the trip making out – there was no reason to think they’d run into anything that required their attention until they reached the north mountain – but he’d be too embarrassed.  And they’d probably get into deep shit.  The admiral had said something about the mission being one for the history books and pointed out that everything they did would be scrutinised by unsympathetic eyes.  The dark and cynical part of Tobias’ mind suggested they’d be critiquing his sexual technique as well as everything else.

And Colin would certainly never let me forget it, he thought.  It would be the end of the world.

He shrugged.  “You get some rest,” he said.  “I’ll wake you in a couple of hours.”

Marigold stood and headed for the bunk.  “Don’t let me oversleep,” she warned.  “We both need rest.”

Tobias nodded, then sat back in his chair and waited, feeling the minutes slowly – very slowly – turning into hours.  It was easier to understand the groundhogs now, when they asked why it took time to get across the system.  The shuttle was travelling at unimaginable speeds, yet it had to travel unimaginable distances.  It felt as if they were crawling – or not moving at all.  He reached for his eReader, brought up his current novel and started to read, glancing up from time to time.  He trusted the automatic systems to alert him if there was a problem, but it was better to keep an eye on them.  The mission could go from boring to deadly in a heartbeat.  It would be no different for Marigold, when she relieved him.

He felt tired, despite his nap, when they finally reached the first waypoint.  The north mountain – such a simple name, for an unimaginably big structure that was part of an even bigger megastructure – hung in front of them.  Or below them.  The sphere messed with his sense of up and down, screwing up his perspective to the point it was hard to be sure of anything.  He’d heard two of the scientists arguing over how the Builders had coped ... personally, Tobias suspected they’d just left it to the automatics. There were human spaceports that refused to allow pilots to land manually.  Why wouldn’t the Builders do the same?

“It’s big,” Marigold said, softly.  “I wonder how they built it?”

Tobias shrugged.  The mountain looked like a volcano ... or a funnel, reaching down to the hatch that led to the universe outside the sphere.  It was fascinating and terrifying to realise the mountain literally reached up and out of the atmosphere, ensuring the air didn’t flow out of the sphere into interstellar space.  There’d been models that suggested the sphere’s interior was completely pressurised ... it wasn’t, but it was theoretically possible.  Personally, Tobias suspected the Builders hadn’t even considered it.  It would have made it all too likely that someone would have climbed up the mountain and out of the gravity well.

He took a breath, forcing his mind to embrace a single perspective.  They were hovering above the very bottom of the sphere.  The hatch was below them.  So was the mountain and the two fists, orbiting the mountain like bullies just waiting for you to step out of the library for a beating.  He shuddered at the thought, even as he worked out the vector they’d need to follow to ensure they stayed out of engagement range.  Or what they thought was engagement range.  If the fists were on alert, it wouldn’t need super-tech to see the shuttle coming and blow her out of the sky.

“Check the course,” he said.  “Does it look right to you?”

“We’ll be corkscrewing in,” Marigold said.  “The gravity field is pretty weird.  But as long as it stays stable, we should be fine.”

Tobias nodded.  The sphere’s gravity was shaped.  It should have been impossible, but ... it was just one of many impossibilities inside the sphere.  There was no gravity, as far as they could tell, inside the funnel.  If they were right, they shouldn’t have any trouble following the course and dodging the fists long enough to get out of detection range.  If they were wrong, they were about to do something that would get a trainee pilot kicked out of the program before he even had a chance to fly a real shuttle.  Tobias had been shown footage of accidents – most, thankfully, in simulators – when he’d retrained ...

He pushed that thought aside.  “Send the compressed transmission, then prepare for the dive,” he ordered.  “We’ll go in five if they don’t notice the signal.”

“Aye, sir.”  Marigold sounded tense.  “Signal sent.”

Tobias nodded, one hand hovering over the launch key.  In theory, the laser signal couldn’t be detected unless someone happened to be holding position directly between the signal and the receiver, in this case a stealthed relay platform positioned ten light seconds from the flotilla.  In theory ... he couldn’t recall a case of a laser transmission being intercepted, not from scratch, but who knew what the Builders could do?  It was scant comfort to know they hadn’t reacted to earlier laser signals, back during the earlier mission.  They might have seen enough since then to change their minds.

“No reaction,” Marigold said.  Her voice was steady, but he could hear the undertone of naked relief.  “We can go as planned.”

Tobias swallowed.  “Brace yourself.  Here we go.”

He triggered the drives, years of training and experience screaming in his mind as he threw the shuttle into a course that would mean certain death under normal circumstances.  The perspective shifted rapidly, the volcano – he tried to tell himself it wasn’t a volcano, that they weren’t falling to their deaths – looming up in front of them, or below them, or ... he gritted his teeth, all too aware they were far too close to the fists for comfort.  The objects wouldn’t have to move at a reasonable percentage of the speed of light to kill them, not here.  They were too close to be dodged ...

The world shifted around him once again.  He had a sudden memory of being trapped in a pipe by a bully, the recollection nearly paralysing him as the shuttle tilted and came to a hover above the hatch.  His head ached as he tried to take in the scene.  The hatch was very much like the hatches he’d seen on old junkyard stations, but it was built on a much bigger scale.  The plate directly below them, locked firmly in closed position, was larger than a battleship.  It made him feel very – very – small.

“Interesting,” Marigold said.  “Do you see what’s missing?”

“A way to open the hatch?”  Tobias had expected a command post at the bottom of the shaft, but all he could see was smooth metal from top to bottom.  It was almost unnaturally smooth, with no hint of wear and tear ... he saw what was missing a moment later.  “No dust.”

“No,” Marigold agreed.  “Odd, isn’t it?”

Tobias wasn’t so sure.  There was a layer of dust on the outer shell – the researchers were still arguing over why, given that the sphere didn’t have a large gravity field – but there was no dust on the inside.  Weird.  Very weird, as there was a gravity field on the inside.  Was there no dust inside the sphere, or ... or was there a cleaning system?  Or ... he shook his head.  It was something else the researchers could argue about, when they stopped debating the last set of impossibilities.  Compared to many other issues, it was a very minor matter.

“I think we’ve learnt all we can here,” he said, slowly.  “I’m going to land.”

Marigold nodded.  “Gently.  Please.”

“Got it.” 

Tobias took a moment to gather himself, then steered the shuttle downwards.  There was no longer any shifting perspective, but ... it still felt weird.  They should be falling and they weren’t ... he put the thought out of his head as the shuttle’s struts brushed against the hatch.  He’d wondered if their approach would trigger an automated opening, perhaps a movement that would pick up the shuttle and crash it into the far wall before they could react.  If he’d built the sphere, he would have made sure nothing could strike the hatch itself ... it would be hellishly dangerous to the megastructure’s integrity even if the atmosphere couldn’t flow out into the cold darkness of interplanetary space.  But nothing happened.  The shuttle brushed against the hatch and rested like a droplet of rain ...

“I feel like a fly, crawling across a windshield,” he muttered.  The hatch was big, so big it made the shuttle look tiny.  He looked up and saw nothing, but the distant star.  It was local daytime.  “Even if I understood what I was seeing, what could I do with it?”

Marigold kept her eyes on her console.  “The gravity field is pretty much non-existent, even so close to the surface,” she said.  “There’s nothing more than a faint hint of gravity and even that is ... not enough to matter.  We could launch ourselves from the hatch and fly back to orbit without difficulty.”

“As long as we didn’t accidentally send ourselves flying into the gravity field,” Tobias said, thoughtfully.  It reminded him of flying too close to an asteroid, except the hatch was mind-bogglingly big.  There was no shortage of horror stories about people who’d jumped off an asteroid and found themselves flying into space, sometimes never to be seen again.  “I think I’ll let someone else volunteer to try that.”

Marigold giggled.  “Me too.”

Tobias chuckled, then ran his hand down the console.  “I think we’ve done as much as we can here,” he said.  “Shall we sneak out?”

“Yeah,” Marigold agreed.  “Get us up to the lip and then we can inch past the fists.”

“If they’re not right on top of the entrance,” Tobias agreed.  “I wonder ...”

He frowned.  The fists had never been observed entering the sphere’s atmosphere – or its gravity well.  Its artificial gravity well.  They hadn’t been observed flying through the funnel either.  Did it mean they couldn’t?  Tobias doubted any halfway competent human air traffic controller would be keen on the idea, no matter how safe the technology was supposed to be, but the Builders seemed to have different ideas.  Perhaps ... it was an odd thought, but one that refused to go away.  Intelligent people had devised tech that had been used and abused by far less intelligent humans.  The early promise of the internet had been spoilt by fools, conmen, hawkers and fascists.  Had the Builders built the spheres for their own people, only to have one shattered by their people’s foolishness?  It was funny, he reflected sourly, that the people who invented the tech were rarely the people who wound up deciding what to do with it.  No, it was the ones who could make up a good excuse who did that.

“Something to write about later,” he muttered.  “Let’s go.”

The shuttle quivered again, gliding upwards so slowly it was easy to feel twinges of impatience.  Tobias told himself, firmly, to keep moving slowly.  The fists were just above them, ready to pounce if the shuttle gave the slightest suggestion they were there ...

Marigold coughed.  “They’re leaving.”

“What?”  Tobias stared at her.  “Are you sure?”

“Yes!”  Marigold sounded irked.  “The fists just up and raced away!  Our path is clear.  We can go home.”

Tobias frowned.  “But ... why?”

Chapter Sixteen: HMS Endeavour, Dyson System (Interior)

“The fists just flew away?”

“Yes, Captain,” Tobias Gurnard said.  He stood in front of her desk, hands clasped behind his back.  His partner – lover – stood next to him.  “They were heading away at speed as we nosed our way out of the mountain.”

Staci nodded, slowly, as she studied the recordings.  Endeavour had been too far from the north mountain to watch in realtime – she was still reluctant to risk the ship by flying too close to the fists – but the live feed from the shuttle and the sensor platforms were as complete as humanly possible.  There was no denying the timing.  The fists had flown away from the north mountain as soon as the shuttle had started to nose its way out of the shaft.  It was ... interesting.

“The fists are currently holding position roughly three light seconds from the mountain,” Jenner said, from where he was sitting on the other side of the ready room.  “That’s more than far enough to let us operate freely.”

“At least as long as they stay there,” Staci pointed out.  Three light seconds ... the fists were about as far from the mountain as Earth was from Luna.  The distance would have been daunting, if the fists hadn’t been spotted travelling at over half the speed of light.  It would take less than ten seconds for them to return to their overwatch positions or smash any human ship trying to make it down to the surface.  “Did you do anything, anything at all?”

“No, Captain,” Gurnard said.  He must have known she knew the shuttle crew had done nothing, but it didn’t show in his voice.  “We were just inching up and out of the shaft when they cleared out of our way.”

“Better not to think of it like that,” Jenner said, sharply.  “They may not have responded to you at all.”

Staci couldn’t disagree.  The shuttle hadn’t posed any threat to the fists – or even the sphere.  She’d seen a fist struck by a nuclear warhead and emerge completely unscratched.  The idea they could have felt threatened was laughable, certainly when a direct collision between the shuttle and a fist would have vaporised the shuttle and left the fist unharmed.  And yet ... if it was a coincidence, she wouldn’t care to calculate the odds.  There were too many imponderables to even try.

“We’ll let the analysts study the recordings and decide what to do next,” she said, finally.  “Return to your quarters and get some rest.”

“Aye, Captain,” Gurnard said.

Staci watched them go, feeling a twinge of amusement tinged with something she didn’t care to look at too closely.  It was a surprise Gurnard and his co-pilot had remained in the navy, given that they’d been effectively drafted into the gunboat program and then reassigned to fly shuttles in Virus Prime.  She wasn’t sure why they had.  They’d been enlisted for the duration of the war and the war was now over, although she supposed pilots with more experience of alien tech might be less likely to panic when confronted with more of it.  And there was no doubting their skill.  Or their limited exposure to naval discipline.

It doesn’t matter how they look, she told herself.  She’d spent most of her careers on small ships, where competence was prized over appearance.  What matters is how they act.

“I didn’t want to say it in front of them,” Jenner said, “but they might have benefited from a break in the fence.”

Staci raised her eyebrows.  “How do you mean?”

“Back when I was a young and green lieutenant, I was assigned to Portsmouth as a naval aide to an up-and-coming admiral,” Jenner said.  His voice was carefully bland.  “I was supposed to get experience of the bureaucratic side of officerdom, but ... never mind that.  Point is, we had a security exercise to test our defences.  A pair of men from D Squadron were assigned to get into the base.  God knows how, but they somehow blagged their way past the guards on the gate and strolled around inside the base for hours.”

“That must have been embarrassing,” Staci said, dryly.

“It was!”  Jenner snorted.  “The whole thing was run like a child’s game.  Never mind that these men were SAS, the toughest of the tough.  Their orders were to surrender the moment they were called out as intruders, if it happened in the first few hours.  All it would have taken is one person noticing a pair of strangers and sounding the alert ... no one did, at least until they strolled into the command centre and took control.  And then it took longer than it should for anyone outside the centre to realise HQs didn’t normally send out for takeout or issue silly orders.”

“Are you sure?”  Staci could name a few officers who’d issued very silly orders indeed.  “Really?”

Jenner chuckled.  “I think someone finally smelled a rat when the HQ ordered a pretty young WREN to strip,” he said.  “Finally.  The Royal Marines went in and there was a mock battle, complete with mock weapons.  The bastards were laughing all the way to the bank.  Two men could have fucked us completely, if they’d been hostile.  The post-exercise evaluations were scathing.”

“I bet they were,” Staci said.  “What’s the point?”

“They got through the gatehouse,” Jenner said.  “And after that, everyone just assumed that they were friendly because the gatehouse had cleared them to enter the base.  They were strangers, sure, but it was a big military base.  They had free run of just about everywhere because no one bothered to question their presence.  The same thing could have happened here, Captain.  The fists saw the shuttle coming out of the mountain, assumed she was a friendly ship because she must have passed through the giant hatch, and moved aside to allow her to fly safely into the sphere.”

Staci nodded, slowly.  “They gave the shuttle far more room than she needed.”

“Better safe than sorry,” Jenner countered.  “Our shuttles might be fragile, compared to the fists, but their ships might be made of the same material as the sphere itself.”

“True,” Staci agreed. 

Her lips quirked.  Battleship armour had been the toughest material known to man, a composite – and highly classified – alloy, but whatever the Builders had used to produce the fists and the sphere’s outer shell was far tougher.  The Admiralty would sell its collective soul to know how to duplicate the material and put it into mass production.  Battleships were tough, but bomb-pumped laser beams could still slice into their hulls.  The sphere wouldn’t even notice if someone tried to hit the shell with a hundred bomb-pumped warheads.  And if the Builders flew ships constructed of the same material ...

She looked at the shuttle’s recordings from within the shaft.  The hatch was huge.  She could steer a planet-sized ship through the hatch, if it opened completely ... she had problems, real problems, in wrapping her head around the sheer size of the thing.  One scientist had flipped out, from what she’d heard, and started insisting they’d shrunk ... she thought she understood, now, what he’d meant.  It was easier to believe the flotilla had been shrunk to microscopic levels than come to grips with the reality of a race that built on such a scale.

But the sphere is just a shell, she told herself, sharply.  It isn’t as if they took a battleship and scaled it up to the size of a planet.

“It’s something we’ll have to consider,” she said.  “But for the moment, the admiral will have to decide just what, if anything, we’re going to do with it.”

“Understood,” Jenner said.  “With your permission, I’ll return to the bridge.”

Staci nodded, then returned her attention to the display.  It was bizarre how the sphere’s interior somehow managed to be both immense, on an interplanetary scale, and strikingly cramped.  The concept wasn’t that hard to grasp, if one didn’t think about it too carefully, but the reality ... she shook her head slowly, wondering if she’d have had an easier time of it if she’d stayed with frigates.  Not that there’d have been any guarantee of being offered a command ... she wondered, not for the first time, if someone had been pulling strings to get her as far from Earth as possible.  She had been Mitch Campbell’s XO, the person most likely to pick up where he’d left off ... no.  She was being paranoid.  Mitch had been a legitimate war hero and she’d been nothing more than his XO, a person unknown to the world.  There was no reason to think she’d been singled out for de facto exile.

Caesar conquered the Gauls, she recalled the old saying.  What?  Alone?  Didn’t he even have a cook with him?

The terminal bleeped.  “Captain,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “Can Ambassador Hammond and I join you?”

“Of course,” Staci said.  She wasn’t really being offered a choice.  Legally, she was the absolute mistress of her ship; practically, she had to give the admiral a great deal of latitude unless the ship was in very real danger.  Thankfully, Admiral Dismukes didn’t seem to be the type of admiral to insist on standing on the bridge and peering over her shoulder.  “You’re more than welcome.”

She called her steward to bring tea and biscuits, then sat back in her chair and surveyed the ready room.  It was messier than she would have preferred, but it couldn’t be helped.  Her cabin had been reassigned before they’d left Earth.  The admiral had his own suite, but it was cramped ... she was mildly surprised she hadn’t heard any complaints about the limited accommodation, although she supposed the chance to command the mission to the sphere made up for any little inconveniences.  The hatch hissed open, revealing the admiral and the ambassador.  They didn’t bat an eyelid at the mess.

“Captain,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “The shuttle brought back an interesting piece of data.”

“My XO believes the fists thought the shuttle was a legitimate visitor to the sphere and moved out of her way,” Staci said.  She made sure Jenner would get the credit.  “He may well be right.”

“Hard to be sure, but seems likely,” the admiral agreed.  “They certainly might well assume no one could get through the hatch without clearance, or that anything in the area had to have come through the hatch.”

His lips twitched.  “Their systems certainly don’t seem to be very intelligent.”

“They probably have orders to report anything odd to higher authority,” Charlotte put in, dryly.  “And when higher authority doesn’t respond, they do nothing.”

“Automated systems can be unreliable, when confronted with the unexpected,” the admiral said.  He cleared his throat.  “We are still barely scratching the surface of the megastructure.”

“Yes, sir.”  Staci keyed her terminal, bringing up a holographic projection of the sphere’s interior.  It was strikingly simple, at least in concept, but the execution ... it was an orrery built on an unbelievable scale.  “It may take us years to find answers.”

“We may not have years,” the admiral said.  He pointed to the images.  “There are two particular places of interest.  First, a command centre near the north mountain ...”

“A place we assume to be a command centre,” Staci corrected, quickly.  The alien building had been spotted during the first mission, but the team she’d dispatched to investigate had been shot down and hadn’t managed to get anywhere near the structure.  “We don’t know for sure.”

“It is the only sign of advanced technology we’ve seen on the surface,” the admiral reminded her.  “Everything else is clearly primitive.”

Staci nodded.  The most advanced optical sensors humanity had been able to produce still had problems picking out traces of intelligent life on the sphere, something the analysts had been unable to explain.  Staci suspected the simplest explanation – a combination of the sheer primitiveness of the sphere’s societies and their distance from the surface – was the most likely.  It was hard to believe the Builders could screw with a simple optical sensor.  If they could ... no.  It was impossible.  She hoped.

“So why did they put the command centre, if it is a command centre, down there?”  Staci eyed the display.  “What were they thinking?”

“We don’t know,” the admiral said, simply.  “Oh, we have speculations aplenty, from the understandable to the absurd, but nothing concrete.  That’s part of the reason for sending a team to the surface as quickly as possible, in hopes of finding something we can use.”

He paused.  “The second place of interest is the lone world,” he added, nodding at the display.  “It practically has to be the command centre for the entire system.”

“Or so we assume,” Staci mused.  “We just don’t know.”

She frowned, stroking her chin.  The lone world was a planet-sized object orbiting within the sphere, far too close to the star for her peace of mind.  It emitted enough energy – and transmissions, unfortunately unreadable – to lend credence to the suggestion it was the system command centre, but it was heavily defended.  There were so many fists orbiting the planet that there’d been no way to get a shuttle to the surface.  The one probe she’d sent, during the previous mission, had been destroyed before it could report anything useful.

“We are currently working on ways to get through the defences,” the admiral said.  “So far, all we have is theory.  The other command centre is far easier to reach.”

“As long as we avoid contact with the natives,” Charlotte said.  “They turned against us with surprising speed.”

Staci nodded.  “Did they know anything about the command centre?”

“Nothing,” Charlotte said, curtly.  “They knew nothing about their world – or anything, really, beyond a hundred miles or so from their community.  They had no conception they were living in a sphere, or that their ancestors had been kidnapped from another world, or anything.  They were nothing more than pets or animals in a zoo and they didn’t even know it.”

Staci was surprised by the anger in Charlotte’s voice.  “They knew nothing?”

“There was no room for development,” Charlotte said.  “No metals, so no swords or ploughshares or anything our ancestors took for granted.  No way to grow enough crops to support an elite, let alone a society that could turn into a unifying empire ... their towns and villages, I think, simply couldn’t grow beyond a certain point.  They were caught in a stasis they couldn’t hope to escape, not on their own.  And the Builders did it to them.  Deliberately.”

“We don’t know that,” Admiral Dismukes said.

“They must have known what they were doing,” Charlotte snapped.  “All known races followed the same path to the stars.  Didn’t they?”

Staci shrugged.  Some researchers speculated the Builders had evolved on gas giants, or stars, or in other dimensions.  Others, more practically, suspected the Builders had been so old, as a species, that they’d forgotten their roots.  Staci would have bet on the latter, if she were a betting person.  Britain and Europe had forgotten their roots too, in the artificial peace imposed after the Second World War.  They’d had to relearn in a hurry, at a price they’d barely been able to pay.  And the repercussions lasted so long they could still be felt even after the first interstellar wars. 

“We should not be so quick to assume malice,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “Yes, they trapped our relatives on the sphere.  But we don’t know they intentionally imprisoned them.  They may have intended otherwise ...”

“If I locked you in a room, with the full intention of coming back to free you, and then – for whatever reason – I never came back and you starved to death,” Charlotte snapped, “I’d be a murderer.  Maybe I didn’t intend to kill you, but it doesn’t matter.  I did something with a predictable result and that makes me morally responsible, even if I didn’t intend a fatal outcome.  I’d be no better than the idiot who fired a gun without bothering to check there was no one in his sights.”

Staci blinked in surprise.  She hadn’t expected such outrage from Lady Charlotte.  But then, she had been stranded on the sphere, at very real risk of having to spend the rest of her life in a primitive environment.  Staci had gone through all kinds of survival training, from boarding school to conduct after capture courses, and she wouldn’t have been pleased to find herself trapped on the sphere.  Just how much human potential had been squandered by the demands of survival?  It made her shudder to think a potential Einstein or Hawking or Sanderson had spent his – or her – entire life struggling to eke a living rather than developing his mind.

“We must be careful,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “If the Builders are truly gone, we may never know what they really had in mind.”

He leaned forward.  “We’ll put together a landing party, with a marine escort.  We’ll try to stay away from the natives as much as possible ... if they do come to meet us, we’ll try to be diplomatic.  If possible.”

“They turned on us,” Charlotte said.  “Make sure the team is armed and armoured.”

Admiral Dismukes grinned.  “Do you want to take the lead?”

“No,” Charlotte said.  Staci was sure the older woman wanted to say something a little sharper.  “I’m going to stay on the ship and get pampered.”

Staci hid her amusement.  Endeavour was hardly a luxury liner.  She was designed and built for long-duration missions, with more onboard entertainment than was customary on any more standard military vessels, but there was very little pampering for anyone.  Charlotte knew it too, except ... even a midshipman’s berth looked like luxury, compared to the sphere’s settlements.  Hotbunking wasn’t so bad if the alternative was sleeping on the cold hard ground.

“Then I’ll arrange for someone else to do it,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “And then ... who knows?  We might discover something worth our while.”

“We already have,” Charlotte said.  “We just don’t want to admit it.”

Chapter Seventeen: Marine Landing Shuttle, Dyson System (Interior)

“All right,” Colin said.  “Listen up.”

He surveyed the motley team in front of him, torn between excitement and a certain awareness that the mission could easily go spectacularly wrong.  He’d thought the higher-ups had learnt their lesson and refrained from sending any more missions to the sphere, at least missions that involved babysitting scientists and diplomats, but he’d been wrong.  Five marines, armed and armoured, were supposed to keep a bunch of researchers safe ... somehow.  The research team might not be composed of idiots – idiots didn’t get degrees in practical science – but they had very little combat or survival training.  What little they did have – briefings during the voyage, perhaps nothing else – would give them a false sense of security.  It was all too easy to imagine one of the researchers eating something poisonous or pissing off the locals or something, anything, that would turn the mission into a horror story for future recruits.

“You’ve all been briefed on the local environment, and you’ve all had your shots, but I’ll go through it again,” he said.  “We will board the shuttle, fly to the north mountain and ride the walker down to the surface, then set out to the alien structure.  During the flight, I suggest you get some sleep.  You are not to use any devices without my prior permission, which will not be forthcoming for anything that radiates a detectable signature.  It could get us all killed.  If you want to snatch a military-grade eReader, do it now.  Once we get down, we will attempt to avoid contact with the locals as much as possible.  There appear to be no settlements close to the alien structure, as far as we can tell, but it is impossible to be sure.  If we do make contact, we will try to be diplomatic.  It may not be possible.”

He paused.  “They are primitive, but they can be dangerous.  They used bows and arrows, wooden spheres and poison blowpipes.  The latter are particularly dangerous, as the poison can paralyse or kill.  Your shots include broad-spectrum protection, but we cannot be sure they will protect against everything.  The good news is that they don’t have the firepower to get through walker or body armour.  The bad news is that you have to wear the armour to protect yourself.  It doesn’t work if you leave it behind.”

The hell of it, he knew, was that it wasn’t entirely a joke.  He knew soldiers who’d played fast and loose with the rules, insisting – when challenged – that they weren’t in a war zone and didn’t have to worry about random people shooting at them.  He saw their point – body armour was hot and uncomfortable – but he felt they were taking unacceptable risks.  They really would be unacceptable, on the sphere.  Colin had seen the locals move with such stealth that they were nearly impossible to spot.  One moment, everything would be fine; the next, all hell would break loose.

“We leave in ten minutes,” he said, indicating the shuttle.  The marine shuttle was larger than the craft Tobias had flown to the north mountain, but still tiny compared to the mothership – or the alien structures.  “If you have any questions, or want to bring anything additional with you, now is the time.  There may be no going back.”

He glanced at Corporal Harris as the researchers headed for the hatch.  “Did you check and recheck the supplies?”

“Yes, sir,” Harris said.  “We all did.  Everything is there.”

Colin nodded.  He’d have to check them himself, just to be sure.  It wasn’t that he didn’t trust his subordinates – they were all experienced men – but he needed to know what he had on hand for when the shit hit the fan.  Weapons, armour, trade goods, heavily shielded research tools ... he wasn’t too keen on those, but his superiors had overridden his concerns.  The researchers swore blind they were safe, that they wouldn’t draw attention from alien sensors, yet ... who knew?  The only upside, he reflected, was that they’d be used in the alien structure itself.  The aliens firing on their own structures would give a whole new meaning to danger close.

But if the systems are automated, they might not be smart enough to realise they were firing on their own bases, he reminded himself.  No one was entirely keen on giving automated systems firing authority – no one human, at least – for fear of terrible accidents.  It wasn’t that long since someone hacked and hijacked a drone and ordered it to attack its own base.

He took a long breath, then scrambled into the shuttle to check the stores before making his way back to the passenger section to ensure the researchers were thoroughly buckled in.  It was probably pointless, but who knew?  They’d survived one crash-landing and they might survive a second ... perhaps.  The aliens might have learnt something from the last incident and adapted their tactics to make certain of their kill ...

“We could fly a lot faster,” Professor Mike Mansion grumbled, as Colin checked his straps.  “Why don’t we?”

Colin shrugged, resisting the urge to point out the professor had volunteered for the mission.  Clearly, he hadn’t spent much time swaggering around archaeological sites with a whip in one hand and a hot girl in the other ... the more realistic side of Colin’s point noted that very few archaeologists actually did.  It was a more slow and sedate profession than the movies dedicated, even if the appalling latest remake of Indiana Jones had been redeemed – slightly – by a girl who’d spent most of the movie without her top.  God knew there’d been no other reason to watch.  The originals had been remade so many times the magic was thoroughly gone.

“If the fists come at us, we’ll be killed,” he said, simply.  He had no illusions.  Tobias and Marigold were great pilots, but evading something moving at half the speed of light would be almost impossible.  “Better to be safe than dead.”

He moved on before the professor could come up with another question.  The man probably hadn’t realised just what spending ten hours in a shuttle meant, not until he’d done it.  Colin understood all too well.  The idea of tabbing across the Brecon Beacons had sounded piss-easy too, until he’d actually tried.  There was a reason the region was used to sort the men from the boys, and it had nothing to do with the raw natural beauty of the mountains.

“We’re all set,” he said, glancing into the cockpit.  “Whenever you’re ready.”

He returned to his seat and closed his eyes as the hatches closed and the drive came online.  He’d long-since mastered the art of getting some sleep whenever he had a chance – there was no point in staying awake, not when there was nothing he could do if the shuttle ran into trouble – and he knew he’d need to be rested when they reached their destination.  The shuttle’s drives hummed around him, the sound carrying him into sleep ... he awoke what felt like moments later, feeling as if no time had passed.  He grabbed a ration bar from his seat compartment and ate it slowly, checking the live feed from the cockpit.  The shuttle was steadily approaching its destination.  He clicked off the feed and forced himself to wait.  If they were about to be killed, he didn’t want to know. 

A dull thump echoed through the hull.  The lights grew brighter.  “We have arrived,” Tobias said, through the intercom.  He didn’t make any stupid airline jokes, for which Colin was profoundly grateful.  He’d heard enough of those on his very first deployment.  “There’s no hint we’ve been detected.”

Colin unstrapped himself and motioned for the bleary-looking researchers to stay in their seats, then headed up to the cockpit.  The shuttle was resting on the edge of the mountain – his mind insisted they were on the verge of falling and tumbling to their deaths, even though it knew it was impossible – and the pathway down to the surface looked thoroughly unsafe.  It reminded him of a rollercoaster, except this ride wasn’t remotely controlled – or safe.  If the walker slipped, they’d be in deep shit.  And if they sent out a signal ...

“I’ll get to the walker,” he said, shortly.  “Open the hatch for me when I’m inside.”

“Got it,” Tobias said.

A handful of researchers looked ready to burst out of their seats as he walked past.  He reminded them to stay put, then hurried past them to the walker.  The giant spider-like vehicle bothered him at a very primal level – walkers had been tested on the battlefield and found very wanting – but he told himself it would suffice.  There were no antitank weapons waiting for them on the surface, unless someone had been selling arms to the locals.  He hoped not, but it was hard to be sure.  The locals could have traded women for weapons.  God knew there were gangs in the Security Zone who did just that.  Or worse. 

And the sphere does have a very unusual ecosystem, he thought, as he scrambled into the driver’s seat.  The locals might have other things to trade.

He started the engine, then steered the walker through the hatch and onto the lip of the shaft.  His head spun as his perspective shifted.  He closed his eyes, centring his mind.  The sphere might be a sphere, and they might be on the inside of a ball, but they were so tiny there was nothing to be gained by treating it as anything other than a planetary surface.  He took the walker around to the hatch, linked airlock to airlock and opened the way into the shuttle.  The research crew staggered to their feet – he guessed half of them had cramps and the others had slept poorly – and stumbled into the walker.  They were too far gone to notice that the walker’s cabin was even more cramped than the shuttle.

Or that we’re leaving a mountaineering cable behind, he thought.  The spider-like walker wouldn’t be needed, once the cable was in place.  It wouldn’t be safe for humans, but it would get the rest of the supplies down nicely.  Hopefully, they won’t recover and start making demands until we’re safely at the bottom.

“That’s everyone onboard and buckled in,” Harris said.  “I think we’re good to go.”

Colin nodded, running his eye over the cramped seats.  “Keep an eye open for a weapons platform moving into position to shoot us,” he said.  “If one does, we may have to bail out.”

He heard Harris mutter something unprintable behind him as he stepped into the driver’s seat and strapped himself in.  There was no reason to think they’d be fired upon – the walker was a more advanced version of the vehicle they’d used to escape last time – but who knew?  The Builders might have let the away team go on the grounds they were leaving anyway, while programming their weapons platforms to shoot anything crawling down the mountain to the surface.  He cursed under his breath as he ran through the final checks, wishing he knew.  It would be so much easier to mentally prepare himself. 

“Here we go,” he said.  “Brace yourselves ...”

The walker advanced forward, tilted over the edge and crawled down like a giant insect.  Colin swallowed hard as the view shifted – his mind screaming they were about to plummet to their deaths – before gathering himself and steering the way downwards.  It was lucky it wasn’t a sheer drop, or the Builders had done something to make suction impossible ... he’d seen that happen, once, and a Para had broken his leg because of it.  The gravity slowly started to pull at him, the straps tightening as the sense he was going to fall grew stronger and stronger.  He heard someone gasping in the passenger cabin and hoped to hell they weren’t going to be violently sick.  Vomit in space was bad enough, but vomit from above would fall onto him and the console.

His lips twisted.  That would be an embarrassing way to die.

The gravity field got stronger as they picked up speed.  The exterior sensors reported the atmosphere slowly becoming breathable, although he knew better than to risk opening the airlock now.  The landscape below slowly took on shape and form, shifting from a blue-green watercolour painting to a reality that reminded him of jungle training, back in the day.  There was no hint of intelligent life, but that was meaningless.  The locals were just too primitive.  The sharpest optical sensors on the walker might see nothing until it was far too late.

Someone retched, behind him.  “Make it stop!”

“Soon,” Colin called back, lying his arse off.  The mountain was levelling out – it was very clear the mountain was far from natural – but they had a long way to go until they reached the bottom.  “We’re almost there.”

He couldn’t tell if the researcher believed him, but it didn’t matter.  The ground was coming closer, the jungle resolving into patches of impregnable woodland next to open ground ... it made him wonder if someone had sculptured the land a very long time ago, crafting gardens that had endured for millions of years.  It didn’t seem likely, unless there were hidden custodians carefully maintaining everything.  His grandmother had been very proud of her tiny garden, but after she’d died the plants had spilled out of their places very quickly and turned the carefully ordered beds into a chaotic mess.  Were the Builders still around?  Or was his mind imposing an order that wasn’t there?

The gravity stabilised as they finally reached the bottom of the mountain.  Colin parked, then detailed the marines to sweep the area while the work crews set up the lower half of the mountain cable.  There was no sign of any watchers.  Colin insisted that the researchers kept their armour on before allowing the civilians to get out of the walker, then kept a wary eye on them.  It wouldn’t be the first time someone ignored safety briefings and wound up getting himself killed – or worse.

We think we can counter their poison darts, he thought, tightly.  The medical teams had come up with dozens of vaccinations and counteragents, some of the latter so untested they could only be used if there was no alternative.  But we only have to be wrong once.

“The air is strange,” Professor Mansion said.  “Why does it smell so ... sweet?”

“No pollution,” Colin pointed out, as if he hadn’t wondered that himself during the first mission.  The sphere had never had an industrial revolution, nor had it suffered the influx of space junk and missile strikes from the interstellar war.  “It’s a natural biosphere.”

“If you don’t count the fact it’s inside an alien megastructure,” Mansion pointed out, sardonically.  “It’s a perfectly realistic fake.”

Colin chuckled, his eyes never leaving the horizon as he scanned for potential threats.  The sphere was larger than any space habitat, be it a colony built from scratch or a hollowed-out asteroid, and clearly needed less maintenance.  A space habitat needed constant monitoring to ensure the biosphere remained stable – there were cautionary tales about colonies that needed to be abandoned until they could be restabilised – but the sphere was easily large enough to rebalance itself.  As long as no one introduced rabbits ... his lips quirked at the thought.  One of the lecturers during the voyage had insisted that, if rabbits had been introduced to Australia’s biosphere with deliberate malice, it would have been the greatest and most successful act of biological warfare in human history.  If that happened on the sphere ...

The dinosaurs would eat the rabbits, he thought.  But who knows what the long-term effects would be?

Harris waved to him.  “The work crews got the cable tied up and anchored, sir,” he said.  “They’re ready to start rolling supplies down from the shuttle.”

“Tell them to get started,” Colin said.  It was a shame they couldn’t anchor the cable to the base plate, but they didn’t have anything that could dig into the alien metal.  “And tell the researchers we’ll be back on our way shortly.”

Harris grinned.  “You don’t want to stay for the base camp?”

Colin shook his head.  Their orders were clear.  They had to make their way to the alien base as quickly as possible, leaving more cable behind them.  He hoped that would go unnoticed.  Landlines were impossible to detect with merely human technology, but who knew what the Builders could do?  He’d been taught to use all kinds of military-grade active and passive sensors, some of which would certainly notice as more and more humans landed to set up a base camp, and he dreaded to think what Builder tech could do.  If they were spotted ...

We’d be happier if they materialised in all their glory and told us to pack up and piss off, he thought.  Right now, we’re poking at barrels and boxes without knowing which one is holding the TNT.

He’d met a woman on leave – crazy between the sheets, crazy out of the sheets – who’d insisted the Builders were angels.  And then she’d insisted that anyone who died was reincarnated on the sphere.  Colin hoped that wasn’t true.  He’d enjoyed his brief stay on the sphere, but he knew he hadn’t wanted to spend the rest of his life there.  Even if the locals had made them welcome, it would have been a short and thoroughly shitty experience.

“We’ll be bringing down more people shortly,” he said.  The crazy woman wasn’t his problem any longer.  He put her firmly out of his mind.  Now the cable was up and running, they could put together a prefabricated base with enough passive defences to provide a degree of security ... at least against the local humans.  If the Builders wanted it gone, it would be gone.  “They can handle the base.  The rest of us can see what they have in store for us.”

“Yes, sir.”

Chapter Eighteen: Alien Structure, Dyson System (Interior)

Colin hadn’t been sure what to expect, as the walker crawled deeper into the sphere.

It was easier, now they were on the surface, to forget that they were inside a sphere.  There was no sense the world was curving around them, no sense they were standing at the bottom of a giant football.  The sphere was simply so immense, there was no visible curvature at all.  It was easy to understand why the natives didn’t realise their world was artificial, much less why they believed the world was flat.  If he’d been trapped on the surface, with no way to get any higher than the tallest tree, he’d have believed it too.

The landscape felt ... strange.  Patches of jungle – each one miles in diameter – contrasted oddly with flat scrubland and rivers, the latter following a pattern that was only visible from high overhead.  The natives were nowhere to be seen.  There weren’t even any visible birds or dinosaurs.  Colin kept his eyes open anyway, although he suspected the walker had scared the local wildlife away.  It was just too alien, to them.  One of the xenospecialists had insisted the Aztecs had been literally unable to see the Spanish ships, when the Conquest of Mexico had begun, simply because they were a giant Outside Context Problem.  Another had poured cold water on that theory, stating it had been devised to make fun of the Aztecs and lend a sense of inevitability to the righteous conquest of an inferior race.  Colin didn’t know which one to believe, although he knew from experience that primitive didn’t mean stupid.  Just because the locals didn’t know how to churn out high tech didn’t mean they couldn’t figure out a way to counter it.

Like the guy who figured out how to set up false emission signatures to draw our fire, Colin thought, recalling a foray into the Security Zone.  How many shells did we waste pasting harmless transmissions, while the bastards laid their traps elsewhere?

The console bleeped.  “Nearly there, sir,” Harris said.  “Are you ready?”

Colin nodded.  He understood, now, how European troops must have felt as they hacked and slashed their way through the jungles of darkest Africa.  The team – his men and the scientists in their care – were all alone.  They had orders to use laser communications only in dire emergencies, at least while they were in transit, and not to use radios under any circumstances.  There was a very good chance, if all hell broke loose, that they’d simply vanish within the wilderness and no one on the ship would have any idea what had happened to them.  Sure, there were plans to use gliders and hot air balloons to explore the sphere, but Colin doubted any of them would get off the ground ... not without being shot down.  The sphere’s defences were a dangerous unknown, yet ... they couldn’t miss a glider, could they?

A chill ran through him as the landscape parted suddenly, revealing ... something.  His eyes started to hurt the moment he looked at it, as if there was something about the alien structure that made it impossible to comprehend.  Someone whimpered behind him as the walker crawled onwards, into the clearing.  Colin barely noticed.  He’d been afraid before – a man who claimed never to have been afraid was either a liar or a fool – but this was different.  The urge to turn and run, as if there was a horde of devils behind him, was almost overpowering.  His hands were halfway to the console before he could stop himself.  The whimpering behind him was growing stronger.

“It’s nothing more than subsonics,” he said, although he doubted it was true.  The walker was supposed to be shielded against such things.  “They’re trying to unnerve us.”

He shuddered as the sense of imminent doom grew stronger.  He’d faced subsonic riot control weapons, as part of basic training, and knew just how dangerous they could be.  The only reason they weren’t used on the streets, outside the Security Zone, was the risk of permanently harming or killing the rioters.  His instructors had told him, before the training, that it would be kinder to fire automatic weapons at the crowd.  Colin hadn’t believed them until the training had begun.  The experience had thoroughly unmanned him.  He knew two recruits who’d dropped out of the training company, immediately afterwards. 

“Sir,” Harris said.  “I think ...

The walker ground to a halt outside the alien structure.  The subsonics – or whatever they really were – faded to a background level, but they were still too intrusive to ignore, a sense that no one could possibly relax for a moment.  His back itched, making him feel as if someone was behind him, preparing to shoot him in the back.  He knew it wasn’t true, but it still bothered him.  He’d wondered, as they prepped for the mission, why the natives never seemed to go anywhere near the alien structure.  He knew now.  If they hadn’t been on the walker, they might not have managed to get close themselves.

“Watch your back,” he ordered, as he unstrapped and headed for the hatch.  “And don’t touch anything until we’ve swept the perimeter.”

He resisted the urge to unsling his rifle as he checked the local environment, then stepped through the airlock and dropped to the ground.  It was covered in grass ... weirdly alien grass.  He eyed it warily, making a mental note to take a sample back to the base camp for the biologists.  They’d insisted that the sphere couldn’t host plants and animals from two different biospheres, simply because they were incompatible, but Colin suspected they were wrong.  Homeworlds – planets that had given birth to intelligent life - tended to have tougher ecologies than worlds that had never evolved anything more complex than a small dog.  The Builders could easily have imported biospheres from a dozen different homeworlds, then left the different biochemistries to fight it out.  Or ...

A shiver ran down his spine.  Or they might constantly work to maintain their garden, unseen by all.

He looked up at the towering structure.  It was hard, almost impossible, to determine anything about it.  The alien structure was as tall as a skyscraper and as small as a simple house; it was huge, bigger than the transit barracks he’d used as a recruit, yet also tiny enough for him to circumvent very quickly.  His eyes seemed to skim over it, as if it wasn’t quite there.  He had the uneasy sense it was changing every time he looked away.  There was nothing he could put his finger on, nothing he could write in a report, and yet ... he shook his head.  It wasn’t a human place.  He was very tempted to suggest that they turn around and flee.

The subsonics are getting to me, he thought, morbidly.  They really didn’t want visitors, did they?

His mind raced as the researchers were helped out of the walker and started setting up their gear.  The Builders had crafted a defence that somehow reached through light armour to drive them away ... how did that even work?  Colin had no illusions about how long the walker would last if someone shot it with an antitank weapon, but the armour should have shielded them from subsonics, radio waves and other passive defences.  And yet, the armour had clearly failed.  He scowled as the platoon spread out, eyes flickering from side to side in a manner that reminded him of raw recruits, rather than trained and experienced men.  They were doing their best not to show it, but they were unnerved.

“Sling your weapons,” he ordered quietly.  “We don’t need any accidents here.”

They obeyed, slowly.  Colin scowled, inwardly.  An officer who couldn’t command instant obedience was no officer, although he had to admit he’d had a couple of commanders who hadn’t appeared to know what they were doing.  Here ... he understood, all too well, why his men didn’t want to put their weapons over their shoulders, even if they could unsling them and open fire at a moment’s notice.  The alien structure made them jumpy.  Colin cursed under his breath.  Jumpy men tended to fire first and ask questions later ...

We’ve been in places where that was a wise policy, he thought.  This isn’t one of them.

He kept an eye on the surrounding landscape as the minutes became hours.  It felt cold and unnatural in a way no space habitat or asteroid settlement could match, even though they were far more clearly artificial environments.  Nothing moved in the distant trees, no birds flew through the air ... they’d been worried about insects, perhaps carrying diseases not covered by their wide-spectrum vaccinations, but there were none of them either.  It was strange.  It felt almost as if he were looking at a tableau, a scene frozen in time.  He wanted to take the walker and drive away, out of the unnatural zone.  But if there were any keys to the mysteries, they were to be found here.

“Fascinating,” Mansion said, waving Colin over.  The American was grinning from ear to ear as he studied his sensors.  “Do you realise this thing is actually shifting through multiple dimensions?”

“No,” Colin said.  “What do you mean?”

“Well, for starters, this is very similar to the alien structure we found at Virus Prime,” Mansion said.  “Our sensor readings are ... odd.  At some points, the structure is no bigger than the average building; at others, it’s mind-bogglingly big.  I think it is actually rotating the different dimensional states around its core structure and ...”

Colin held up a hand.  “In plain language, please?”

Mansion hesitated.  “Think of an elevator.  You call it to your floor, climb in and push the button to go to your destination.  This thing” – he waved a hand at the building – “works on much the same principle.  You choose your destination and it comes to you, then you step inside.”

“I see,” Colin said.  Even stripped of technobabble, it was hard to wrap his head around it.  He half-wished Tobias had come with them.  They needed a nerd-to-jock translator.  “It’s more like the building itself is an elevator – you step inside, choose your destination, and the building shifts around you.”

“In a sense,” Mansion agreed.  Colin couldn’t tell if he meant it or if he was just humouring the soldier.  “In our terms, it would be absurdly pointless.  In theirs, maybe not so much.”

He looked back at the wall.  It seemed to shimmer, as if it wasn’t quite there.  Colin stared at it, feeling his head twist painfully.  The wall was ... his eyes skipped over it.  And yet, it was there, undeniably there.  What was it?

Mansion stepped forward.  “The structure itself – the pan-dimensional tesseract – seems to be constantly asking a question,” he said.  “I think we can try to answer.”

Colin tensed. “Are you sure?  What will happen if you’re wrong?”

“I think” – Mansion pressed a device against the wall and keyed a switch – “we have to find out.”

“You ...”  Colin bit off the response that came to mind as the wall ... opened.  “What ...?”

He swallowed, hard.  There’d been no sense of a door opening.  The opening had simply appeared, as if it had been there all along.  Had it?  He’d been in places where holograms had been used to conceal secret entrances ... for all he knew, the hologram had simply been turned off.  And yet ... up close, it was somehow easier to stare into the darkness.  The urge to run was fading away.

“Interesting,” Mansion said.  “I was right.”

Colin felt a hot flash of anger.  “You could also have gotten us all killed,” he snapped.  “One pulse from the orbital weapons would kill us all, in the blink of an eye.  Don’t do that again!”

Mansion eyed him.  “Would they fire on their own structure?”

“I saw insurgents climbing on tanks during the war,” Colin said.  “Do you know what the tanks did?  They hosed each other down with machine guns.  The insurgents were torn to pieces.  The tanks were completely unharmed.  And for all we know, the orbital weapons are about as dangerous to this ... this thing ... as machine guns are to tanks!”

He glared at the scientist, willing him to understand.  He understood the importance of taking calculated risks, but there were limits.  It should have been discussed first, with half the team withdrawn to a safe distance – or what they thought was a safe distance – before they took the risk, ensuring someone would survive to report back to base if the alien weapons opened fire on the team.  Mansion had every right to want results – Colin knew the professor’s career would be made, if he unlocked the big secrets – but not at the risk of getting the entire team killed.  If Mansion did it again, Colin would tie the idiot up and ship him back to base.  It would be worth whatever trouble he encountered, later on, if it kept the team alive.

“Fine,” Mansion said.  “Now, if you don’t mind ...”

“Wait,” Colin ordered.  He nodded to Harris.  “Keep the rest of the team outside.  If you don’t hear from us in five hours, signal the ship and request orders.”

“Aye, sir,” Harris said.

Mansion snorted. “Should the team lead be walking into an alien structure?”

Colin made a show of shrugging.  The technical answer was no, but he didn’t trust Mansion to go in alone and he didn’t want to put any of his subordinates in the position of having to stop the scientist from doing something stupid.  It wouldn’t be long, he was sure, until more people arrived at the site, including senior officers who could keep a lid on things ... but he had no idea how long it would take.  And he wanted to know what was inside the structure too.

The entrance loomed in front of him.  It wasn’t quite dark – there was a faint light – but he couldn’t tell where it was coming from.  His eyes hurt whenever he tried to look for the source.  The walls looked as if they were bronze, but if they were really bronze he’d eat his hat.  He couldn’t help thinking of the alien structure they’d seen at Virus Prime; proof, he suspected, that they’d been crafted by the same race.  Humans and Tadpoles both constructed fleet carriers, but they looked very different even though they served the same function.  It was difficult to think the two alien structures had been produced by two separate races. 

“Interesting,” Mansion commented.  “The gravity field is slightly lesser here.”

Colin glanced at him.  “How come?”

“I don’t know,” Mansion said.  “If this structure is a pan-dimensional structure, the gravity field may not be linked to the gravity field outside ... the one permeating the sphere itself.  In fact ...”

He glanced back and froze.  “Shit!”

Colin looked back.  The door was gone.  “Fuck!”

He grabbed for his radio, then caught himself.  He had no idea what would happen if he started transmitting from inside the structure, but he doubted it would be anything good.  It might just get them both killed.  Mansion turned and walked back to the door – or where the door had been – and ran his hands over the metal.  Colin followed, his heart sinking.  There was nothing to suggest there’d ever been a door, let alone a way to open it.  The wall was as solid as a starship hull.

“Interesting,” Mansion said.  “I wonder ...”

Colin reached out and tapped the wall.  His hand seemed to skitter over the metal, as if he couldn’t touch it.  “What’s interesting about it?”

“I guess we’re slipping through the dimensions again,” Mansion said.  “I think we have to go on.”

“You think?”  Colin knew he had nothing better to offer.  He had some explosive packs in his belt, but if Mansion was right trying to blow their way out would be worse than useless.  Given how tough the alien metal was, it would be pointless even if the scientist was wrong.  “You can’t send another signal to the wall?”

“I can try,” Mansion said.  He took his terminal from his belt and pressed it against the wall.  “I suspect this isn’t going to ...”

He paused.  “Interesting.”

“Interesting,” Colin repeated.  He was starting to hate that word.  “What is it?”

“I got a response,” Mansion said.  “I wonder if ...”

He keyed the terminal and waited.  There was a long, chilling pause.

Colin looked at him.  “What are you doing?”

“There was a theory about the sphere – the original sphere, the one we found at Virus Prime,” Mansion said.  “They thought the sphere was an intelligence test, of sorts.  You pass the tests, the sphere reveals its secrets.  If you don’t ... the sphere is just a chunk of alien metal.  It’s possible this building is a test too.”

“They knew we were coming?”  Colin found it doubtful, although if one had the tech to find and enter the sphere it was just a matter of time before one found the alien structure.  “Or ... someone.”

“Perhaps the locals,” Mansion said.  “Right now, they’re trapped on the surface.  They can’t get into space.  They can’t even hammer out a working tech base.  But if they get into the structure and pass the tests ...”

Colin shook his head.  “You needed a terminal to send the first signal,” he said, flatly.  “How could the locals produce something like it for themselves?”

“There may be other ways,” Mansion said.  “They can find a key.  We can use a lockpick ...”

He paused.  “Ah.”

“Ah?”

“I think I’ve figured it out,” Mansion said.  “If this is right ...”

The opening reappeared.  Bright sunlight stabbed at Colin’s eyes.  “You did it!”

“Barely,” Mansion said.  “But I think I’m getting the hang of their logic now.  They have extra dimensions to this structure, which adds a – ha – extra dimension to their thinking, but we can comprehend and use them.”

He paused.  “Shall we continue?”

“Let me inform the ship first,” Colin said.  “And then we can proceed.”

Chapter Nineteen: HMS Endeavour, Dyson System (Interior)

“So,” Charlotte said, once the remnants of dinner had been removed and the stewards had brought cups of coffee to the guests.  “The alien structure is actually an intelligence test?”

“It seems so,” Doctor Athena Gaurs said.  “We’ve barely scratched the surface of the structure, and getting into each section requires us to figure out how to open the doors, but ... it does seem designed to test anyone who wants to get inside.  Professor Mansion believes the structure was originally intended to give the natives a way into space, if they reached a point they could crack the intelligence tests.  He might be right.”

Admiral Dismukes leaned forward.  “But we’re cheating.  We’re using computers to crack the puzzles and break into the structure.  How are the natives intended to match that?”

“We don’t know,” Athena said.  “It’s possible the natives are supposed to evolve into beings capable of manipulating the world around them by sheer force of will.  That’s one theory, backed up by the fact we have been unable to determine just how the structure repels anyone trying to approach it.  It’s possible the repulsion effect is a form of telepathy ... possible, but unproven.”

“I’ve never heard of telepathy being proven to exist,” Captain Templeton said.  She looked at Charlotte.  “Was there any sign, even the slightest hint, that the natives had psychic powers?”

“None,” Charlotte said.  “There was no suggestion they could read our minds, or sense our presence, or anything else, certainly nothing to match the feats of Ella the Esper.  They did manage to communicate with us pretty quickly, but we were using computers to crack their language and speed up the process as much as possible.  To be honest, if they had something akin to telepathy, I would expect fewer wars.”

“Perhaps telepathy actually makes the wars worse,” Admiral Dismukes offered.  “It’s possible to maintain plausible deniability, if you’re translating from one language to another.  A word that sounds like an insult might not be anything of the sort, or you could swear blind you didn’t know it was insulting when you said it, because it isn’t so insulting in your language.  But telepathy would make it impossible to avoid knowing what someone really thinks of you.”

Or what people are thinking, as they look at you, Charlotte thought.  She’d met her fair share of men who’d undressed her with their eyes, when she’d been younger, and dreaded to think what they’d been thinking.  If she’d known ... would she have been horrified, or flattered, or so offended she threw the first punch?  There would be no way to hide from someone’s feelings.  Your husband, when he’s tired of you; your wife, when she’s fed up and wants something more in her life ...

“There was a story about a group of people who were carefully inserted into a primitive society, in the hopes they could do magic because they believed magic worked,” Athena said, slowly.  “But I don’t think that would happen here.”

“There’s certainly no reason to assume the natives would evolve telepathy,” Admiral Dismukes agreed.  “We may be completely wrong about the structure.”

“Yes,” Staci agreed.  “Which raises another question.  How long do we spend poking and prodding at the alien intelligence test?”

Charlotte frowned.  She understood the need for answers.  Admiral Dismukes was under immense pressure to deliver something – anything – before the beancounters lost interest in the sphere and decided to fund something else.  It was hard to wrap her head around anyone deciding to abandon the sphere, but it was hard – too – to understand the sheer size of the sphere unless you saw it with your own eyes.  The beancounters wouldn’t travel all the way from Earth to see the sphere.  There were too many other problems nearer home.

“We have time,” Charlotte said.  “Don’t we?”

“For the moment,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “We’re expanding the base camp at the bottom of the mountain and laying landline cables to allow direct communication between us and the alien structure, but sooner or later we will draw attention from the locals.  Or make an accidental transmission that will draw fire from the orbital weapons platforms.  We’ve taken all the precautions we can, but ... screw-ups are inevitable.”

“That leaves another problem,” Charlotte said.  “What else can we do?”

“If the theory about the alien structure being an intelligence test is accurate, it may be designed to limit what we can learn from it,” Athena said.  “The Builders may have designed it to allow very limited contact, under very tightly controlled conditions.  We are learning a great deal from studying the device – our sensor records will fuel genuinely original research – but I think we won’t be able to crack the entire system.  We need to get to the lone world.”

“Can we?”  Admiral Dismukes leaned forward.  “The planetoid is surrounded by fists.”

Charlotte nodded in agreement.  There were so many fists surrounding the lone world that it was hard to isolate the individual objects, at least at such a distance.  She had the uneasy sense that dispatching a shuttle, even on a ballistic trajectory, would merely get the pilot and crew killed.  The fists had smashed a stealthed probe without breaking a sweat ... the analysts, she’d been told, had no idea how they’d even known the probe was there.  The most likely theory – the alien sensors were good enough to pick up the probe’s gravity signature, even though it was miniscule - was also the most alarming.  If that was true, she’d been cautioned, no human tech could hope to hide from alien eyes.

“It depends on how intelligent the defenders actually are,” Athena said.  “If we’re dealing with an automated system, one programmed to react to certain stimuli without actually thinking, we can probably get through the defences if we’re careful.  If the system is programmed to alert someone higher up the command chain, if it doesn’t understand what it is seeing, we may find it harder to get through.”

“If there’s someone intelligent keeping an eye on things,” Staci said, “you’d think they’d have reacted to us by now.”

“They may not consider us particularly important,” Charlotte pointed out.  “How much damage could we do if we opened fire?”

“To the sphere itself?  Almost nothing.”  Admiral Dismukes spoke so coolly Charlotte knew he was concerned.  “To the native settlements ... maybe quite a bit.  It depends on just what the orbital platforms have been programmed to regard as an unfriendly act.”

Charlotte nodded.  She knew from experience the platforms fired on anything trying to enter the sphere’s atmosphere.  The fleet was armed with kinetic energy weapons – and there was no shortage of raw materials outside the sphere that could be converted into makeshift KEWs if the fleet ran short – but the platforms would probably vaporise the projectiles before they reached the surface.  The analysts hadn’t been able to turn up any suggestions the surface had ever been hit by something large enough to cause real damage, certainly nothing on the same scale as the Bombardment of Earth.  Charlotte doubted they’d find anything.  The alien orbital weapons were too powerful.  They’d been damned lucky to survive.

“We think there’s a way to wrap ourselves in a protective shell of pseudogravity,” Athena said.  “It should let us pass for one of their craft, if they notice us nosing around their system.  If the defenders are unintelligent, they may assume we have a perfect right to be there – like they did at the mountain – and ignore us.  They may even open the way for us!”

“I suspect not,” Staci said.  “They didn’t open the big hatch.”

“Can they?”  Athena sounded unconvinced.  “There are so many layers of dust on the far side, gathered over millions of years, that ... that the sphere may be unable to open the hatch even if it wants to.  We don’t know.”

“The shuttle was also entering the sphere, from their point of view,” Admiral Dismukes pointed out.  “Why bother opening the hatch?  The shuttle was already inside the sphere.”

“We should test it first,” Staci said.  “Perhaps on something a little less consequential than the lone world.”

Charlotte couldn’t disagree.  “If it works, we can move on to the lone world.”

“Yes,” Admiral Dismukes agreed.  “And if it fails ...”

His eyes lingered on the holographic projection, the display showing everything they’d learnt about the sphere in the last few weeks.  It was frustrating.  They’d learnt so much, but so many mysteries remained unanswered.  She understood the admiral’s determination to figure out at least one of the secrets, before he was recalled to Earth and replaced by someone else.  Charlotte felt the same way too.  There were limits to how long an ambassador might remain at her post before she was recalled, for fear of her going native and forgetting her true role.  Her lips twitched in bitter amusement.  That was unlikely to happen here.  There were no local officials trying to worm their way into her good graces – or, just as likely, looking for a way to blackmail her.

A regular ambassador who spends all of her time moving between the embassy and the government offices is one who thinks she knows the host country, but is inevitably wrong, she thought.  And thinks her advice is based on solid reasoning when it actually comes from false information ...

She put the thought out of her mind.  There were no alien officials to mislead her, not here.  She was in no danger of being tricked into betraying her country.  But the timer had begun the moment the flotilla left Earth.  She would be recalled too, sooner or later, and her successor would claim the credit for any discoveries made after she left.  Not that she’d be able to claim all the credit ...

“Make the preparations to test the concept,” Admiral Dismukes ordered.  “If it works, we can proceed to a bigger target.”

“Yes, sir,” Staci said.

Charlotte leaned forward.  “And now we should talk about something else,” she said.  She hadn’t organised the dinner to talk shop, although with a guest list of military and scientific personnel she supposed it was inevitable.  “These dinners are intended to let us get to know each other, not discuss the mission.”

Admiral Dismukes smiled.  “What else do we have in common?”

“We could always go around the table and introduce ourselves,” Staci offered, even though they knew each other.  “Or talk about the weather.”

“The weather on the sphere is odd,” Athena said.  “It’s a great deal more regular – and predictable – than the weather back home.”

Charlotte sighed, inwardly.  “Do you think the weather is actually controlled?”

“It’s hard to say,” Athena said.  “Weather manipulation technology never really got off the ground before it was banned by international treaty.  We don’t have much of a baseline for any sort of advanced weather tech.  But the sphere is certainly large enough to have hurricanes and tempests and they don’t seem to be in evidence.  The largest weather front we’ve tracked is a mild rainstorm, something that would pass unnoticed on Earth.”

“I see,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “The sphere is an artificial environment, though.”

“Yes, it is,” Athena agreed.  “But it is too large to be perfectly controlled.  The weather should be a great deal more unpredictable.  And yet, it is remarkably mild.”

“Odd,” Staci agreed.  “What do you think it means?”

Charlotte sighed again, then settled down to listen.

***

“Rough flight?”

Tobias shrugged as he stumbled out of the shuttle and passed the control keys to the shuttlebay supervisor.  “Nothing happened, save for tossing out supplies as soon as we reached the peak,” he said.  “But the fists are always there.”

“Got it,” the supervisor said.  “See you next shift.”

Tobias nodded and made his way back to the cabin.  It had been a rough few days.  The shuttles – all of them – had been assigned to hauling supplies from the freighters to the base camp, trying to make sure the team on the ground had enough to last them for a few months, if the fists returned and drove the shuttles away.  He was glad he wasn’t down there, no matter how many people talked about the adventure or the promise of hot and willing native girls.  Adventure was someone else in deep shit, far away, and he already had a girlfriend.

The hatch hissed open as he approached.  The shower curtain was pulled closed, suggesting Marigold was in the shower.  They’d been assigned to fly different craft, something that was either proof their commanders had confidence in them or a very bad sign indeed.  Tobias was confident in his abilities – and hers – but a second pair of eyes was always welcome.  On paper, much of the flight could be safely automated.  In practice, Tobias wasn’t so sure.  It only took seconds for a situation to go straight to hell.

Marigold stepped out of the shower a moment later, as naked as the day she was born.  Tobias couldn’t help himself.  He stared.  She wasn’t as pretty as the brainless beauties he’d known at school, but none of them could hold up their end of a conversation, or fly a shuttle, or swap out a piece of gear while under enemy fire.  Her brown hair fell in ringlets around her head, with her bare breasts rising and falling with every breath she took.  She’d been pudgy once, years ago, she’d said.  Military food and discipline had slimmed her down.  And ...

“Down boy,” she teased.  “I’m on duty in thirty minutes.”

Tobias groaned, theatrically.  “Quickie?”

“Not enough time,” Marigold said.  “How were the flights?  Any changes?”

“None that I saw,” Tobias said.  The sense they were racing against the clock had pervaded the ship, even though he didn’t know why.  There was no reason to think the fists were about to start intercepting and destroying the flotilla’s shuttles, as long as they didn’t try to land on the surface.  “Get there.  Unload.  Get back here.  The ground crew has gotten better at the unloading too.”

“Poor them,” Marigold said.  “Stuck up there, rather than back here or the ground.”

Tobias shrugged, then sat on the bunk to watch as she dressed.  He’d hated every moment of his enforced time on the surface, as every last second they’d been there, he’d been all too aware they might be trapped for the rest of their lives.  He’d loathed outdoor activities as a child and teen and they had been in places where they could be cut short, if there was an emergency.  Colin and his peers might enjoy the thought of roughing it – it was easy to imagine Colin as a barbarian warlord, galloping across the plains with a pair of naked women tied to his horse – but Tobias knew he wouldn’t last a day.  It would be like Lord of the Flies, not Tunnel in the Sky.  The first time he’d read the book, he’d guessed the fate of poor Piggy before he’d reached the second chapter.

He leaned back as Marigold left, feeling a twinge of disquiet.  It felt odd to be flying alone, no matter the justification.  And yet ...

The intercom bleeped.  “Pilot Gurnard, report to the Captain’s ready room.”

Tobias cursed under his breath as he stood, checked his appearance and hurried through the hatch.  The captain was calling ... he feared it wasn’t good news.  Captain Templeton was a good officer, he supposed, but she was far too much of an action heroine for his peace of mind.  He honestly wasn’t sure why she’d been assigned to a survey ship.  Surely, a frigate or cruiser would have been more appropriate.  Unless she was earmarked for high rank ...

He put the thought out of his head as he pressed his hand against the buzzer and waited.  The hatch hissed open, revealing a tidy compartment that gave the impression of being unkempt and messy.  Tobias felt an odd flicker of fellow-feeling.  His bedroom back home had been much the same when he’d been a schoolboy.  Now, his mother had packed away his stuff and rented out the room.  Tobias didn’t blame her.  They’d been trapped on the breadline ever since his father had died, during the war.

“Captain,” he said.  “Pilot Gurnard, reporting as ordered.”

“Mr. Gurnard,” Captain Templeton said.  She looked as tired as he felt.  Tobias wondered, suddenly, if she had anyone to confide in.  He doubted it.  “You are aware, of course, of the problems with making a close approach to the weapons platforms?”

“Yes, Captain,” Tobias said.  He’d been shot down by an alien platform.  The Chinese had lost a shuttle themselves.  At practically point-blank range, the poor bastards hadn’t stood a chance.  “They react to anything that approaches them.”

Captain Templeton met his eyes.  “We think we have a way to get close to them – very close – without being detected.  Would you like to fly the mission?”

No, Tobias thought.  It wasn’t something he could say out loud.  Commanding officers did not make requests.  His mind raced as he considered the possibilities.  He knew he was probably the best pilot for the mission.  And if I say no, Marigold is likely to be tapped to take my place.

“If it can be done,” he said, slowly.  “What do they have in mind?”

“They think they can hide a shuttle from alien sensors,” the Captain told him.  “Naturally, your craft will be prepped on the understanding the researchers may be wrong.  You’ll be able to bail out if they spot you.”

Cold comfort, Tobias thought.  If they spot me so close to them, they’ll open fire before I have a chance to reach for the eject button.

“It should be doable,” Tobias said.  “What do I do if I do get very close?”

“For the moment, nothing,” Captain Templeton said.  “We want to know if it can be done.  We’ll decide how to proceed from there.”

“Understood,” Tobias said.  “When do I leave?”

“After you’ve had a rest,” the captain said, firmly.  “It’ll take several hours to get the shuttle prepped, anyway.  You’ll be called when it’s time for the briefing.”

Tobias nodded.  “Aye, Captain.”

Chapter Twenty: HMS Endeavour/Shuttlecraft One, Dyson System (Interior)

It was evident, even to her, that Tobias Gurnard didn’t consider himself a military officer – or even an enlisted man.

Staci studied the shuttlecraft pilot thoughtfully as Doctor Gaur ran through the briefing outline.  He was almost painfully young, a draftee who should have been discharged from the service after the war.  It wasn’t as if the Royal Navy was short on shuttlecraft pilots – or anything else, really.  There was never any shortage of young men and women willing to sign up for the navy.  Reading between the lines, Staci suspected he’d been allowed to stay at least partly because he had no ambitions to rise in the ranks.  Her lips twitched in cold amusement at the thought.  Most everyone wanted to be a starship commander, not remain a lower decks officer for their entire careers.

And when it becomes clear they won’t be promoted, they resign and take their experience with them, she thought.  She knew an intelligence officer who’d resigned after being forced to take orders from a lower-ranking starship officer once too many times, even though the chain of command clearly said starship officers took precedence.  Having someone who has no intention of climbing the ladder to command might be a blessing, under the right circumstances.

Her lips quirked.  That might have been true, once.  Now ... Gurnard had more experience, flying shuttles around the sphere, than practically everyone else.

“We cannot guarantee they won’t react to you,” Doctor Gaur finished.  “But you should have a chance.”

Staci stepped forward.  “If you get the slightest hint they know you’re there, back off and we’ll think of something else,” she added.  “I trust your judgement.”

Gurnard nodded, stiffly.  It didn’t take a social expert to tell he was nervous.  Staci didn’t blame him.  She’d had few qualms about taking risks during the war, but she’d known what she’d been facing and she’d been able to calculate the odds.  Here, it wasn’t clear just what the odds actually were.  If everything went to plan, they’d be in their favour ...

No, in his favour, Staci thought.  She wasn’t the one taking the risks.  If this doesn’t work, he’ll be dead before he knows it.

“Good luck,” she said.  “We’ll be waiting for you.”

“Thank you, Captain,” Gurnard said.  “I appreciate it.”

Staci smiled, rather wanly, as she walked him to the shuttle hatch.  A starfighter pilot would have made a wisecrack – most either boring or irritating or plagiarised – or even made a pass ... against regulations, even for starfighter pilots, but one took a different view of such things when the next mission could easily be the last.  Staci had known pilots who’d been cocky and confident and thought they’d been God’s gift to women, pilots who’d flown into battle and never come home.  She rather liked Gurnard’s more careful attitude, even though it wouldn’t win any drama awards.  A businesslike mind was more likely to survive the coming mission than one inclined to show off.

She watched him step inside the hatch, then sighed inwardly as she turned and made her way to the bridge.  It wasn’t the first time she’d sent someone into danger, nor was it the first time she’d been unable to calculate the odds of their survival, but it never got any easier.  She’d always thought she owed it to herself to share the risks, yet – as Captain – she couldn’t join the missions to the sphere.  She had to watch from a safe distance and wait while her subordinates took all the risks.  And if she was wrong ...

This might not be a safe distance at all, she thought, morbidly.  Human tech couldn’t hope to hit Endeavour at such a distance.  Builder tech?  Who knew?  But that doesn’t make me feel better, does it?

***

The sphere, Tobias reflected for the hundredth time, was a thoroughly bizarre environment.  It felt both confining and yet empty, with vast tracts of empty space – enough for the entire navy, with room left over for the rest of humanity’s starships – and tiny sections buzzing with alien activity.  He found it easier to try to fly by sensors, although he dared not place too much faith in his passive sensor suite.  An object that was pretending to be a hole in space – an old ambush tactic – would pass completely unnoticed, at least until he crashed into it.  At his current speed, the impact would atomise him ...

And given what we know about the metal they use to build their spheres and fists and what-have-you, he thought, there’s a very good chance that whatever I hit won’t even notice.

It was a baffling thought, he mused, as he loosened his straps and settled back with an eReader.  The boffins were going mad trying to work out just what the aliens had done to produce their metal.  It was a composite, they insisted, but a composite of what?  The military planners had suggested using mass drivers in a bid to clear away the fists, hitting the alien projectiles from clear across the sphere, but if the fists were as tough as the boffins thought it was going to be completely pointless.  Perhaps.  Tobias could understand why they were so perplexed.  Hitting an object at a reasonable percentage of the speed of light really should be a one-shot kill.  That it wasn’t ...

He wished, suddenly, that Marigold had come with him, even though he knew it might lead to them both being killed.  If she’d been there ... he shook his head.  The entire shuttle was being monitored, with an entire team of analysts recording everything for future study.  He tried not to snort at the thought.  He could understand recording the live feed from the sensors, but the live feed from his suit?  What possible good would it do to monitor that?

His lips twitched.  A future historian may stand up and say, one day, that Pilot Gurnard had an attack of flatulence at precisely 1756, during his famous mission to check out the alien weapons platform.  This incident may have triggered his death at 1900 ...

Tobias sighed, then kept reading.  There was no point in trying to sleep.  He’d had a rest on the ship and now, with the shuttle flying into unexplored territory, he didn’t want to be completely out of it.  He was going to be a long way from the north mountain, he reflected sourly, a distance so far it would be literally impossible on Earth.  If he crashed on the sphere again, he was fucked.  Someone – he forgot who – had once calculated it would take nearly a year to walk around the entire globe, assuming one could walk on water and didn’t need to pause to eat, drink and shit.  Here ... he tried to estimate how long it could take to walk to the base camp and came up with at least twenty years.  Impossible, of course.  He might as well snap his fingers and wish himself home. 

The alarm bleeped, hours later.  Tobias sat up, reached for the injector tab beside his chair and pressed it against his neck.  He disliked using any sort of stimulant, certainly anything stronger than coffee, but he had no choice.  He’d been doing nothing and yet he felt tired.  A rush of energy ran through him, making the world appear to sharpen for a long cold moment.  He bit his lip, hard, to focus his mind.  The rush was great, but also dangerously deceptive.  He knew what would happen if he let the drug overwhelm his common sense.

He keyed his console, bringing up the passive near-space display.  The alien weapons platform wasn’t trying to hide.  It hung in geostationary orbit – Tobias’ mind insisted it was geostationary, even though he knew it wasn’t – high over the sphere, well clear of the atmosphere.  Tobias’s eyes drifted past the light code on the display, rising to stare at the sight ahead of him.  The blue-green blur messed with his head.  It made him feel alone, completely alone.  He was, too.  The nearest human was nearly five light minutes away.

They sent me so far because they didn’t want to risk the base camp, he thought.  It was understandable.  No one knew how the weapons platform would react.  Better to ensure there was only one target in range, if it started lashing out.  And ... at least, I don’t have to wait for orders before I act.

His fingers danced across the console, checking the laser link to the stealthed platform two light minutes behind him.  Endeavour would have a complete record of everything that happened, for all the good it would do.  He hoped – prayed – it would be enough to give the boffins a clue, if their first plan failed.  And if they asked Marigold to fly the second mission, Tobias hoped she’d have the wit to refuse.  There was nothing to be gained by them both being blown to hell.

“I am deactivating the primary drive now,” he said, more for the benefit of the recorders than anything else.  The cynical part of his mind wondered if his sanity would be questioned for effectively talking to himself.  “The reprogrammed secondary drive is coming online ... now.”

An odd little quiver ran through the shuttle as the gravity field faded and died.  Tobias felt ... weird, as if he were slightly dizzy.  He’d done his fair share of zero-gravity exercises and missions, and he’d long since grown used to being without gravity, but the pseudogravity felt odd.  His head felt as if it were congested, as if there were pressures inside his skull threatening to crush his brain.  He gritted his teeth, reminding himself that the sensations were imaginary.  The experts had assured him there was no real danger.

The human body isn’t used to microgravity, he’d been told.  And pseudogravity is something altogether new.

“The pseudogravity field is stable,” he reported.  He’d discuss his own experiences later.  He had no doubt the doctors would make him go through every last detail, before and after they scanned the medical recordings.  “I will start the approach now.”

The gas jets hissed.  Tobias allowed himself an irked smile.  There was no need for the sound effects – it wasn’t as if he could hear the gas jetting into space, just a simulation – although he supposed it served a useful purpose.  The drive fields only imparted velocity as long as they were powered up, but gas jets pushed the shuttle along a ballistic trajectory that wouldn’t stop until he countered the motion or the shuttle crashed into something.  It wasn’t a pleasant thought.  Normally, the odds of actually hitting something were vanishingly low, but here ... he was flying directly towards something that could kill him, deliberately or not.  If he messed up ...

He raised his eyes.  The alien weapons platform was slowly coming into view, a tiny dot in the far distance that was slowly, very slowly, growing larger and larger.  It was difficult to believe it was nearly a kilometre long, nor that there were no visible weapons on its surface.  The boffins guessed – after the Chinese experience – that the entire surface was a weapon, capable of spitting venom in all directions, but there was no way to be sure.  Not without taking a platform apart to see how it worked.

A shame there aren’t any visible gunports, he thought, snidely.  We could try to crawl through into the interior.

He frowned as the platform took on shape and form.  It looked like a club – he couldn’t escape the impression it was going to smash him – hovering in front of the shuttle.  He doubted the natives could ever invent a telescope, one capable of picking out the weapons platform from the alien sky, but if they ever did it would shock them.  He’d once read a story about a pair of rocket scientists whose rocket had sent back pictures of a stone angel – it had made sense in context – and nearly had heart attacks.  It would be much worse for the sphere’s natives.  They’d think their god had sent his club to beat them to death.

It might get me too, he reminded himself.  If this doesn’t work ...

“Everything has a gravity signature, from the largest supergiant star to the smallest material object,” Doctor Gaur had said.  “You have a gravity field, although such a tiny one that it is impossible for human tech to detect.  The Builders, however, appear to have gravimetric sensors so advanced they are capable of detecting stealthed probes because of their impact on the local gravity field, a really neat way of tracking probes that should be undetectable.  If, however, we generate a pseudogravity field to trick the sensors into thinking you’re one of them ...”

Tobias gritted his teeth as the shuttle neared the platform.  No one, absolutely no one, would let an unknown ship so close without making damn sure of her bona fides.  No one human, at least.  The Builders had good reason to think their platform was pretty much indestructible, at least by any merely human technology, but ... there was a fine line between confidence and arrogance.  They had to be aware of the risks posed by primitive technology, didn’t they?  Or did they think they were the only species that would ever develop high technology and reach into interstellar space?  It wasn’t entirely impossible.  The Vesy were thousands of years old, but they’d never developed anything more advanced than the wheel.

His breath came in fits and starts as he drifted onwards.  He hadn’t felt so vulnerable since the day Colin had ... he bit down on that thought hard, keeping his hands on the controls, ready to flash-wake the drive and run if there was the slightest hint of trouble.  The platform felt dark and silent and yet he was sure, at a very primal level, that it was watching and waiting for him.  If it had the slightest idea he was there ...

I could cram this entire shuttle with nukes and detonate them as I land on the platform and it might survive, he thought.  He didn’t know anything human, save perhaps a battleship, that could shrug off a chain of nuclear explosions.  What do they have to fear?

He keyed his console as the shuttle drifted past the platform, releasing the tiny sensor package and nudging it to drift near the platform.  If the boffins were right, trying to land would be asking for trouble.  But they might learn something through passive observation ... perhaps.  Tobias doubted it, but the decision was above his pay grade.  Instead, he squirted the data he’d collected back to the stealthed platform, then steered the shuttle well away from the platform.  He wouldn’t risk bringing the drives back online until he was quite some distance from the platform.  There was no point in risking everything just to get back to the mothership a few hours sooner.  He’d be home soon enough.

Great, he thought.  When did the ship become home?

***

“The platform didn’t react,” Staci said.  She sat at her desk, studying the sensor recordings from the mission.  The admiral and Doctor Gaur sat facing her.  “Was there anything, anything at all, that might suggest it knew the shuttle was there?”

“No, Captain,” Athena said.  “The analysts – mine and yours – have both been through the records.  There’s no hint the platform detected the shuttle, even when the craft was close enough for the pilot to reach out and touch it.  It’s possible, as Mr. Gurnard suggested, that the platform simply didn’t think the shuttle posed a viable threat, but that seems unlikely.  The shuttle could have been carrying something capable of destroying the platforms.”

“Perhaps,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “Do we have anything capable of destroying a platform?”

“No,” Staci said, flatly.

“Wonderful,” Admiral Dismukes said.  The sarcasm in his tone was biting.  “We think we have a way through the enemy positions, but do we?”

“I think we have to stop thinking of them as the enemy,” Athena said.  “They could have wiped out the entire flotilla by now, sir – hell, they could have blown Endeavour and Haikou out of space during the first mission, if they wished.  I think the Builders are long gone and we’re dealing with their automatic systems, devices incapable of reacting with actual intelligence.  They are dangerous, true, but they’re not malicious.”

“Neither is a scorpion,” Admiral Dismukes pointed out.  “That doesn’t stop them stinging you, painfully, if you try to pick them up.”

“They were incredibly advanced,” Staci said.  She could see Athena’s logic, but she knew the dangers of jumping to conclusions.  “You’d think they could come up with something akin to our own computer networks, the systems that are borderline intelligent.  Why didn’t they?”

“We’ve always been reluctant to take that step,” Athena said.  “The risks are imponderable.  The Builders might have felt the same way.”

Admiral Dismukes shook his head, slowly.  “So ... we have an abandoned pair of spheres, and a giant intelligence test, and ... and what?  Do we actually know anything?”

“Not enough,” Athena said.  “We may be able to speed up our explorations of the sphere now, if we can land shuttles on the surface without needing to fret about having them shot down, but there’s no guarantee of finding anything.  We need to explore the lone world.”

“There’s no guarantee of finding anything there either,” Staci pointed out.  “But it is the one place that seems unique, in the sphere.”

“It may be a decoy,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “For all we know, the real command centre is somewhere on one of the sunshades.”

“True,” Staci agreed.  She had to admit he had a point, if the Builders had wanted to hide their base from alien explorers.  If.  She hadn’t seen anything to suggest the Builders were interested in hiding anything, not inside the sphere.  “But what other choice do we have?”

“I have to confer with He,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “Start putting together a mission to the lone world.  It’s time we figured out what we are really dealing with here.”

Chapter Twenty-One: HMS Endeavour, Dyson System (Interior)

“Captain,” Atkinson said.  “We are nearing the first waypoint.”

“No sign of detection,” McDougall added.  “There’s no hint they’re reacting in any way.”

Staci nodded, curtly.  Space directly ahead of Endeavour was buzzing with red icons, each one representing a fist capable of ramming into the starship and smashing her into atoms without taking any damage itself.  She couldn’t help thinking they were inching towards a swarm of angry bees – she had memories of discovering a wasp’s nest in the garden, years ago – without knowing precisely when the insects would take notice of their presence and react.  The boffins thought they were at a safe distance, but who knew for sure?  The situation could go from manageable to disastrous in the blink of an eye.

It’s worse than flying the Death Star Trench in the simulator, she thought.  Starfighter pilots were fond of recreating the iconic scene, even though it was unlikely to occur in real life.  The enemy armour has been set to invincible and their speed set to impossible.

“Hold position at the first waypoint,” she ordered, calmly.  “Helm, be ready to evade at a moment’s notice.”

“Aye, Captain,” Atkinson said.

Staci felt the tension rising as the starship slowly glided to a halt, relative to the lone world.  Her sense of scale was all messed up.  The lone world was a planetoid two-thirds the size of Earth, but it felt smaller ... as if they were crawling towards an enemy formation rather than an actual planet.  It was daunting to realise the Builders had thrown entire planets around with ease and then dismantled the rocky worlds for raw materials, a grim reminder of just how wide the gulf between them and the other known races actually was.  She thought she understood, now, why so many Vesy had killed themselves when they’d realised they were so far behind everyone else.  They’d thought they’d never catch up.  And they might have been right.

They’re not, she told herself, firmly.  Our tech may be advanced, compared to theirs, but it isn’t magic.  Given time, they can learn to comprehend, duplicate and eventually improve upon it.  And we will learn to master super-tech too.

“Captain,” Atkinson said.  “We are at rest, relative to the lone world.”

Staci nodded as a faint hum echoed through the starship.  Keeping their drives powered up was going to put a hell of a lot of wear and tear on the drive nodes, as well as rendering detection certain against a normal opponent, but there was no choice.  There’d be no time to power up the drives if a fist came at them, if they had any warning at all.  No point in trying to outrace it, either.  They had to dodge the fist or die when it hit them.  She was too experienced an officer to believe they could survive even a glancing blow.

“Deploy the first set of prepped drones,” she ordered.  “And then prime the shuttlecraft crew for departure.”

“Aye, Captain,” Jenner said.  Her XO glanced at her.  “The probes will go live in twenty minutes.”

Staci nodded, hearing the words he didn’t say.  They’d had a long and barely civil discussion about the risks of using active sensors so close to the lone world, even though it was probably the only way to get hard data on just what was waiting for them without running into it.  Staci didn’t blame him.  It was his job to point out the risk, to be the voice of caution.  She’d done the same, when she’d been an XO herself.  A captain who bitched and moaned about someone being pessimistic was a captain who was likely to get himself and his crew killed.

Mitch always let me have my say, she recalled, with a flicker of affection tinged with exasperation.  He just didn’t always listen.

The display updated slightly as the probes glided into position, linking to the ship through a pair of stealthed relay platforms.  Staci suspected – and she knew the boffins agreed – that there was no point in using the relay platforms, not when laser light had no gravity field for the alien sensors to track, but she knew better than to take unnecessary chances.  There were times when they had to cut corners, and take risks that would horrify sane people, yet this wasn’t one of them.  The time-delay wasn’t long enough to seriously impede their operations.

Admiral Dismukes’ head materialised beside her.  “Captain,” he said.  “You may proceed when ready.”

Staci nodded, concealing her irritation.  A combat-experienced admiral would know to take a backseat and let his subordinates get on with it, even if it threatened to turn him into a legitimate Admiral Dunsel.  It didn’t matter who took the greater share of the credit as long as the mission was carried out.  She smiled inwardly, recalling one of her elder brother’s war stories.  He’d been in the middle of a firefight when a staff officer had tried to take command, issuing orders that had confused the gunners and nearly cost the platoon their lives.  Staci had no idea what had happened afterwards, but she hoped the idiot had been court-martialled and dishonourably discharged.  She knew from grim experience that even a brief period of confusion over who was really in command could be disastrous.

“Thank you, Admiral,” she said.  She supposed she shouldn’t blame him too much.  He was a spectator now, his life and reputation utterly dependent on Staci and her crew.  “We will ping the defences in five minutes.”

She leaned back in her chair, projecting an aura of calm that bore little resemblance to the churning storm inside her.  Her crew would take their cues from her and if she looked to be panicking, they’d panic too.  She had to fake it till she made it ...

“Captain,” Jenner said.  “The first probes are in position, ready to go live.”

Staci braced herself.  “Go live.”

There was a brief, chilling pause as the laser signals shot across interplanetary space.  Staci had a moment to wonder, despite knowing there would be a tiny delay, if something had gone spectacularly wrong, before the display lit up like a Christmas tree.  She leaned forward, watching as active sensor pulses – everything from primitive radar to live gravity pulses –swept through the region, highlighting the fists and other alien platforms.  Her lips twitched in grim amusement.  If you were going to be detected, and she was certain an active sensor platform would set off alarms right across the sphere, you might as well take advantage of the situation to use everything.

“Captain,” McDougall snapped.  “Fist #17 is leaving orbit.  Trajectory, straight for the probe.  The first contact protocols are transmitting now.”

Staci nodded, keeping her expression blank.  The fist was picking up speed impossibly quickly – her sensors were tracking the gravity beams – and heading straight towards the probe.  It felt wrong to see kinetic weapons used on such a scale – even the famed Ark Royal’s mass drivers hadn’t been so capable – but she figured it made sense.  If she’d been able to recover each missile after she’d fired it, so it could be recycled, she’d do it too.  The display kept updating, more and more pieces of data flowing into the passive sensors, as the fist closed in on the probe.  The two icons converged.  One flew onwards, stopped dead, then reversed course.  The other was gone.

“Captain, there was no response to the protocols,” MacPhee said.  “There was no hint they even heard the messages.”

“Nor is there any hint they scanned us,” Yang added.  “The relay platforms are still intact.”

Staci nodded.  Endeavour wasn’t a stealthed ship, not compared to a scout, but she was designed to be difficult to track.  No one knew what she might encounter, beyond the rim of explored space, and it was better for any potentially unfriendly aliens never to know she’d been anywhere near them until a sizable fleet was on standby, ready to intervene if the aliens turned out to be hostile.  Normally, Staci could be reasonably sure of evading detection.  But here ... if the theory about how Builder sensors worked was true, and the evidence suggested it was, the aliens probably already had a lock on her location.  They should have had one from the moment she’d jumped into the sphere.

Which adds meat to the theory we’re dealing with a set of automated defences, she told herself.  No sane mind would let a bunch of uninvited aliens run around the interior of the sphere, even if they couldn’t get close to the lone world without being intercepted and destroyed.  There’d be no way to keep us from launching a devastating strike at point-blank range.

Admiral Dismukes was thinking along the same lines.  “Captain,” he said.  “I believe we can proceed with stage two.”

Staci nodded, curtly.  “The data is being forwarded to the shuttle pilot now,” she said.  They’d had a long debate – she didn’t want to say argument – over just who should fly the stealthed shuttle.  A pilot with experience flying within the sphere, or a pilot who’d flown a dozen stealth insertion missions?  “They can launch when ready.”

“And good luck to them,” Admiral Dismukes said.

***

You know, Lieutenant Pepper Caucasus thought as she ran through the final set of flight checks, this would be a really good time to take my sick leave.

Her lips twitched in irritation.  She’d been awed when she’d first seen the images of the sphere, delighted when the USN had assigned her to the exploration mission, but now she was having second thoughts.  She knew what it was like to insert commandos into enemy territory, sneaking through layer upon layer of sensor platforms and missile launchers that would blow her out of the air if they got a sniff of her presence, but this was different.  The alien defences were both tough and dangerously unpredictable.  Pepper was used to taking risks – she’d spent the war knowing her luck could run out at any moment – but it was impossible, here, to calculate what the risks were.  And yet, the idea of backing out was unthinkable.  She’d never been able to say no to a dare.

The display lit up as she brought the shuttle’s systems online.  The Dark Eagle was designed to be as close to undetectable as possible, at a staggering cost to the American taxpayer, but if the theories about how the alien defences worked were correct all her stealth systems were worse than useless.  Pepper had seriously considered, when she’d been volunteered for the mission, asking to fly a regular shuttle instead.  The admiral hadn’t seemed open to argument.  She could see his point – humans used several different kinds of active and passive sensors, and the Builders probably did the same – but the Dark Eagle had one great disadvantage.  If she was detected, her ability to break contact before she was blown away was very limited.

She tongued her mouthpiece.  “This is Pepper,” she said.  “Disengaging ... now.”

Her craft lurched once, then steadied as she fell towards the lone world.  The nasty part of her mind wondered if she was being tracked, if the British crew were following her passage with passive sensors and trying to determine how best to track similar shuttles, if the Great Powers ever came to blows again.  The Dark Eagle would have Russian or Chinese counterparts soon, if she didn’t already.  There were no pieces of technology so unique they couldn’t be duplicated, once they were seen in action.  Humanity wouldn’t have survived the first alien war if she hadn’t copied alien tech and put it into mass production at breakneck speed.

She felt her heart start to beat faster as the shuttle glided onwards and calmed herself with an effort.  Automated defences were easy to beat, as long as you were careful.  She’d flown through entire formations of orbital weapons platforms, enemy installations that could have vaporised her in a flash, if they’d known she was there.  They hadn’t.  This was just the same, she told herself.  In some ways, it was easier.  The automated defences didn’t seem to be repositioning themselves after the active sensor scan.

They must have heard the first contact messages, she thought.  She couldn’t believe the Builders didn’t have radio, of all things.  The idea of a race not developing radio technology as it climbed into space was bizarre.  They’d need so many other pieces of tech that came from radios that she couldn’t imagine they’d missed it.  Surely, if they knew we were here, they’d respond.

Her mood hardened as the display started to fill with red icons.  The fists were small, on an interplanetary scale, but immense compared to her shuttle.  She’d watched the sensor records carefully and noted what had happened to the original probes, how they’d tried to dodge the fists only to discover the fists looping back and continuing the chase.  It seemed unfair, somehow.  Pilots didn’t normally need to worry about missiles and projectiles flying past them and then coming back.  But the fists did.

This is your last chance to abort the mission, she thought.  She’d once flown through an entire enemy formation, passing so close to their flagship she’d half-wondered if they had seen the shuttle and chosen to ignore her.  If you don’t back off now ...

She took a breath, then keyed the gas jet.  The shuttle fell towards the lone world, towards the swarm of objects in orbit.  They moved in straight lines, following ballistic trajectories ... if she hadn’t seen a fist break orbit and smash the probe, she’d had thought the mission piss-easy.  Dodging objects on predictable courses was easy.  Avoiding craft that moved unpredictably was a great deal harder.

They can’t see me, she told herself.  I’m safe.

Sweat prickled down her back, making her flight suit itch, as the seconds ticked by.  The alien objects seemed unaware of her.  Normally, she would have kept her distance as much as possible, but now ... there was no way to be sure what was a safe distance.  She allowed herself a tight smile.  Enemy planners didn’t normally leave a safe passage through their defences ... and when they did, it was often a trap.  She’d grown up hearing stories about a pilot who’d flown over Mainland China, during the Taiwan Crisis of 2030, and thought he was completely untouchable until a hypersonic missile smashed him out of the air.  In hindsight, the Chinese had let him get well into their defences before opening fire, making sure they’d have the best possible chance to shoot him down.  If the first missile had missed, the second or third would have done the job.

The lone world seemed to loom in front of her.  She keyed her controls, slowing her flight as the passive sensors probed the alien world.  It was ... odd, so perfect a sphere she couldn’t help wondering if it was another alien artefact.  If you could build a Death Star, or a Fifth Empire Planetoid, why not?  There was no atmosphere, not even the tissue-thin layer of gases she’d flown through during basic training on the moon.  She thought that was odd, too.

No craters either, she mused.  Her optical sensors should have been able to pick out any hints of imperfection – or damage.  If this is the command centre for the entire system, how do we get in?

The range was steadily closing, the planetoid growing larger and larger until it dominated the skyline.  It felt refreshingly normal, compared to landing on the sphere.  Pepper disliked cargo hauling – it was boring and unglamorous – but she had to admit the sphere presented an unusual set of challenges.  Here, the lone world was almost normal.  The vacuum was a headache – she’d flown missions where she’d used a planet’s atmosphere to airbrake, then parachute down to the surface – but she could cope.  She thought ...

Her display flashed red.  Something had happened ... she cursed under her breath, bracing herself.  The shuttle was already dumping her raw sensor readings to the mothership.  Pepper glanced at the readings herself, trying to figure them out.  The threat receiver was having problems working out what had happened.  A radar beam or laser net would have been understandable, if disastrous.  The odds against breaking a laser communications beam were staggering – she’d never heard of it happening outside rigged simulations – but she would have understood it too.  This ... this was new.

An alarm bleeped.  A fist was moving out of position, heading straight for her.  Pepper cursed again – there was no doubt, now, that she’d been detected – and brought the drives online.  There was no point in trying to hide.  She had to evade – and quickly.  More alarms bleeped as the fist picked up speed, accelerating at a speed she would have thought impossible if she wasn’t staring at it.  She knew missiles that didn’t accelerate so rapidly.  She tried to evade, only to watch helplessly as it changed course to match ... still picking up speed.  Her time was running out ...

She pulled her helmet into place, then keyed the ejector switch.  She was blasted out of the cockpit and sent spinning though space, the force of the ejection nearly turning her into a pancake.  She had a brief glimpse of something as the alien projectile hit the shuttle, a flash of light that marked the death of her ship, then ... she swallowed, hard, as she started to tumble towards the planetoid.  She could have landed safety on an airless asteroid, with no gravity field worth the mention, but the lone world was pulling her down.  There was no way her suit’s tiny thrusters could do more than slow her fall slightly.  It wouldn’t be enough to make a difference.

And she knew, as she closed her eyes and prepared for the end, that no one could get to her in time.

Chapter Twenty-Two: HMS Endeavour, Dyson System (Interior)

“Did we fuck up?”

Charlotte, sitting at the conference table, had no answer.  The American stealth shuttle should have been able to slip through the lone world’s defences and land neatly on the surface, a proof-of-concept mission that would have cleared the way for other shuttles, loaded with researchers and their equipment.  Instead, the shuttle had been spotted and vaporised.  It wasn’t clear if the pilot had ejected in time to save her life, but it didn’t matter.  The most optimistic projection suggested she’d run out of air and suffocate long before any help could arrive.

And we’re not even sure she is alive, Charlotte thought.  The moment she turns on her PLB, the fists will come for her.

“I want answers,” Admiral Dismukes snapped.  “Did we fuck up?”

Charlotte felt a strange mixture of sympathy and irritation.  The admiral had lost an American pilot, which would loom large in the eyes of his superiors, as well as an extremely valuable stealth shuttle.  Charlotte had heard, through the grapevine, that the shuttle had been impossible to track with passive sensors, while turning on the active sensors so close to the alien world would be nothing more than an expensive way to commit suicide.  Admiral Dismukes had taken a calculated risk, when he’d assigned the shuttle to the mission, and his superiors would be annoyed he’d revealed its existence for nothing.  If they were anything like their British counterparts, they’d go through all the sensor records until they found something they could use to insist the admiral should have realised the danger and then drop a hammer on him.  God knew Thomas had grumbled about armchair admirals who’d forgotten what it was like to stand on a command deck, without the advantage of hindsight, and issue orders based on what you knew at the time.  She was entirely sure the Americans had their fair share of such idiots.  They were a universal phenomenon.

Doctor Athena Gaurs cleared her throat.  “As far as we can tell, from the final datastream, the shuttle crossed a focused pseudogravity beam,” she said.  “There was no reason to expect it, nor was there any way to detect it until it was too late.  We think, judging from incomplete sensor records, that there might be a web of such beams surrounding the planetoid.”

“You mean, like a laser net,” Admiral Dismukes snarled.  “Are you sure?”

“No,” Athena said, flatly.  She didn’t sound intimidated by the admiral’s obvious anger.  “It is extremely difficult to detect and track pseudogravity beams.  From a distance, the best we can do is calculate where the beams should be.  In hindsight, the shuttle crossed a beam we could not detect, only predict.  Our predictions might be completely wrong.”

“Yes,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “And a promising young officer is dead.”

Athena looked irked.  “Admiral, with all due respect, we are dealing with alien technology we are only just beginning to understand.  It will be years, at best, before we understand it well enough to determine where the limits actually lie, let alone all the possible uses the Builders have had centuries to work out for themselves.  The idea we can just take a look, wave a magic wand, determine how it works and then put it into mass production is the stuff of science-fantasy, not reality.  No matter how we try to dress it up, we are not so much learning by doing as we are poking and prodding at alien devices to see what they do.  There is no way to be sure nothing will go wrong.  Our understanding of this world” – she waved a hand at the bulkhead and the sphere beyond – “is about as limited as a caveman’s understanding of New York.”

Charlotte cleared her throat before the argument could get out of hand.  “The death of a young pilot is tragic,” she said, flatly.  She’d briefly met the American, who’d seemed a fine young woman.  She wondered, sourly, how military officers coped when they ordered people they knew into danger, all too aware they could wind up dead.  Or worse.  “Do you want to discontinue the mission?”

The admiral scowled at her.  “Do you think we can?”

“No.”  Charlotte had hashed and rehashed the political arguments.  The multinational mission was the only thing standing between the human race and a mad rush for the sphere.  Everyone and their aunt would be sending private missions, if they thought they’d miss out if they didn’t.  And the tech was just too important to risk leaving alone.  The nation that gained sole control over such power would rule the world.  “Doctor, can we get a shuttle through the defences now?”

Athena said nothing for a long moment.  “I believe we can refit a shuttle with additional pseudogravity generators,” she said.  “It may be possible to bend a pseudogravity beam around a shuttle, or compensate for the beam’s sudden termination, in a manner that won’t set off alarms.  The beams aren’t actually that powerful, as long as they’re not interacting.  It should be doable.”

“And if you’re wrong?”  Admiral Dismukes didn’t sound convinced.  “We could lose another shuttle.”

“Yes, we could,” Athena agreed.  “The risk is hard to calculate.”

“The risks of drawing back are not,” Charlotte said, quietly.  She would have been happier if she’d been sure there was no way to get to the planetoid.  Or that there were no secrets waiting to be discovered.  “If we report failure, you know what will happen.”

The admiral scowled.  Charlotte understood.  Thomas had told her, more than once, that the commanding officer received the lion’s share of the blame for anything that went wrong, even if it hadn’t been his fault.  The buck stopped with him.  He’d be in trouble even if one of his subordinates disobeyed his orders, on the grounds that a good commanding officer would never be disobeyed.  Charlotte didn’t think it was particularly fair, or logical, but the world was neither.  If something went wrong, someone had to be blamed.  It was a law of nature.

Stupid, she thought.  We know so little about the sphere that a reasonable decision could look anything but in hindsight.

“Doctor, have your team start refitting the shuttle,” Admiral Dismukes ordered.  “I want the craft ready to fly as quickly as possible.”

“Got it.”  Athena leaned forward.  “There is one piece of good news.”

“Great,” Admiral Dismukes said, with heavy sarcasm.  “Hit me.”

“The shuttle brought up her active sensors in the last few seconds of life,” Athena reminded him.  “One of those sensors was ... ah, a gravity pulsar.  The shuttle swept it over the planetoid.  It spotted a very odd twist in the planetoid’s gravity field.”

“A twist?”

“Yes.”  Athena keyed her terminal, bringing up a holographic image of the lone world.  “Unlike the sphere itself, the planetoid is massive enough to have a gravity field.  Our reading suggests it is two-thirds standard, although we won’t know until we get down there.  This field appears to be natural, produced by the planetoid’s mass, but there is a faint twist in the gravity field here.”

Charlotte frowned.  “It looks like a funnel.”

“I think so, yes,” Athena said.  “Or an arrow, pointing to the way in.”

The admiral scowled.  “Are you sure?”

“No.”  Athena didn’t bother to hide her annoyance.  “There’s no way to be sure of anything.  However, the surface area of the planetoid is roughly three hundred million square kilometres and searching it all, even with orbital sensors, is going to be a long and difficult task.  The surface does appear to be relatively flat and even, to the point we can be relatively sure the planetoid was built from scratch, but it will still take time to search it.”

Her lips twitched.  “For comparison, the total surface area of Earth – the parts of the globe not covered by water – is around one hundred and fifty million square kilometres.  Earth is a lot more varied in terrain, true, but just how long do you think it would take to search that?”

Charlotte nodded.  On an interstellar scale, Earth was barely a dust mote.  On a human scale, Earth was so immense as to be beyond comprehension.  Britain was a relatively small country, as countries went, and yet Charlotte had seen little more than a tiny fraction of her homeland.  The idea of searching an entire world was laughable.  She’d heard horror stories of serial killers hiding out in the ruins, after the Bombardment, and remaining uncaught for years, even with small armies hunting them.  No, Athena was right.  If the gravity twist was pointing to a specific place on the sphere, it was worth investigating that place first.

“Point,” the admiral said.  He shook his head slowly.  “Get the shuttle ready, then have Captain Templeton ask for volunteers to fly the mission.  I want a clear path to the surface before I risk sending researchers down too.”

Athena stood.  “I’ll see to it, Admiral,” she said.  “I’m happy to fly the mission myself.”

Admiral Dismukes raised his eyebrows.  “Can you fly a shuttle?”

“No,” Athena said.  “But I can reprogram the gravity generators on the fly.”

“So can the pilots,” the admiral said.  “They can handle it.”

Athena nodded, then headed for the hatch and stepped outside.  Charlotte waited until the hatch had hissed closed behind her, then looked at the admiral.  “I’m sorry about your pilot.”

The words sounded weak and ineffectual, even in her own ears.  What did one say, when a young woman went out on a mission and never returned?  Charlotte had hosted parties and gatherings to support the troops and told herself she was doing something useful, but she’d never been close to anyone who’d lost a husband or a child.  She had always known there was a risk that, one day, Thomas would never come home – after all, that had happened to Mitch – but it had never felt quite real until she’d lost her lover.  The scripted condolences she’d offered to strangers who had lost relatives suddenly seemed worse than useless, even to her.  What could mere words do to comfort someone who’d lost a husband, who’d had their entire life turned upside down in the blink of an eye?  She was surprised, in hindsight, she hadn’t been punched.  She’d deserved it.

“It is easy to say she knew the risks, and they will say that back home,” the admiral said, quietly.  “But it doesn’t make it any easier.”

Charlotte nodded.  Men and women both served on the frontlines now, but there was something worse about a young woman dying in combat.  It was rare, vanishingly rare, for a woman to serve with the troops, although support units often found themselves in combat when the enemy located their position and attacked.  The navy was more evenly balanced, but women still made up less than a fourth of its total personnel.  And if a young woman was killed in action ...

“We knew people would die, as we explored the sphere,” the admiral added.  “But it is never easy to prepare for it, either.”

“No,” Charlotte agreed.  She’d come very close to being one of those statistics.  If she’d died on the shuttle, or the surface, there was a very good chance her body would never be recovered for a proper burial.  She wondered, idly, how she’d be remembered.  It would be easier to treat her as a heroine, or a martyr, once she was safely dead.  “We will remember her.”

And how many people would make sure to attend your funeral, her thoughts mocked, just to make sure you really are dead?

She reached out and touched the admiral’s hand.  “I’m sorry,” she said, again.  “I wish there was more I could offer.”

“I understand,” the admiral said.  “There are no words, are there?”

He stood.  “I have to write a letter.  As her commanding officer, I have the responsibility to write to her parents and tell her she died in the line of duty.  I have to say something to make it sound as if I knew her, as if we were close enough for me to know her even though the difference in our ranks makes it impossible for me to be believed.  And then I have to brief the next pilot and reassure him that we think we got it right, this time.  I doubt he’ll believe me.”

Charlotte couldn’t disagree.  No one with half a brain would believe the admiral and his staff knew everything about the sphere.  She’d watched a movie about an action hero who had the power of jumping back in time, whenever he ran into difficulties, allowing him to feel his way through the enemy defences until, from their point of view, the hero had just walked into the base and strolled through the defences one by one.  The real world was rarely so obliging – or cheap.  They’d bought greater insight into the enemy defences with the life of a young pilot, but ... would it be enough?  She didn’t know.  No one did.

She watched the admiral leave, her thoughts spinning in circles.  It would be so much easier if they could get everyone to agree to leave the sphere alone, to work on developing humanity’s technology independently, but ... it wasn’t going to happen.  No one in their right mind would expect anyone to keep their word, not with so much at stake.  The cheating would begin from Day One.

The intercom bleeped.  “Lady Charlotte, please report to the captain’s ready room.”

Charlotte stood.  “On my way.”

The starship felt ... terser somehow, as she walked through corridors that were no longer strange and unfamiliar.  Part of it, she was sure, was just how close they were to the lone world and its orbiting defences.  They were too close for comfort.  She’d seen the simulations.  If the fists came at Endeavour, the odds of the survey ship getting out of the way in time were very low, even if the fists didn’t alter course to run the vessel down.  The dull thrumming echoing through the bulkheads didn’t help.  It wasn’t the steady background hum she’d learnt to find comforting, after spending a few weeks on the ship.  It was ... different, ominous.

And there’s a limit to how long we can keep the drives powered up, she reflected.  The naval crew knew what they were doing, but still ...  If we burn out the nodes, we might be targeted and destroyed before we can make repairs and escape.

She stopped in front of the hatch and keyed the buzzer.  The hatch opened a moment later, revealing a hologram of the lone world and its defences hovering over the captain’s desk.  It was hard to be sure, but Charlotte thought there were more red icons orbiting the planetoid.  The shuttle pilot hadn’t died in vain.  She hoped, morbidly, it would be some consolation to her family.  Privately, she doubted it.

“Captain,” she said.  “What can I do for you?”

“We are preparing the next shuttle now,” Captain Templeton said.  “How do you rate their chances?”

Charlotte blinked in surprise.  She was no naval officer.  Sure, she’d been married to one officer and involved with another and spent most of her ambassadorial career on a starship, but that didn’t make her an expert.  It struck her, a moment later, that the captain wanted to talk about something different, that she was asking about the mission’s chances as a way of opening communication.  Charlotte sighed, feeling as though she was about to walk into a conversational minefield.  She wouldn’t have minded so much, back home, but here ... it could easily turn into a nightmare.  Or a bloody pain in the arse.

“Doctor Gaur believes we can trick the enemy gravity sensors into thinking their beams haven’t been broken at all,” she said.  “It seems plausible, given how we managed to get a shuttle close to a weapons platform without losing it, but ... we don’t know.”

“No,” the captain agreed.  Her eyes never left the display.  “If this was a routine tactical problem, it would be easy.  We either launch a diversionary attack on one side of the planet, to draw attention away from the other side, or simply launch KEWs on ballistic trajectories to smash the defences one by one.  It wouldn’t be that hard.  The monstrous orbital battlestation beloved of science-fantasy is a dangerous liability in real life, as she’s a giant sitting duck.  Here ... the fists are practically indestructible.  We hit them with a nuke and they didn’t seem to notice.”

Charlotte frowned.  “What if we used mass drivers?  Push a projectile straight towards the nearest fist at high speed?”

“Hard to say,” the captain said.  “Based on what we know, the fists shouldn’t have survived any of the impacts we’ve seen them survive.  We saw them hit a probe at a speed that should have vaporised both craft, yet the fist survived.  It makes you wonder ...”

“Go on,” Charlotte said.

“Our gravity generators are ... sticks and stones, compared to theirs,” the captain mused.  “We can generate a single gravity field and that’s it.  They can twist and shape gravity into a pretzel.  We know they use pseudogravity beams to push the fists around the system, so ... why can’t they wrap gravity around the fists like shields?  If the fist never really strikes the object ... does it get damaged?”

“You mean, we’ve been looking at the fists all wrong?”  Charlotte cocked her head.  “They’re not the weapons themselves, merely the vehicles?”

“Perhaps,” the captain said.  “I’ll send the theory to the boffins.  See what they make of it.  If we can disrupt those gravity fields, it might be an easier way to find our way through the defences and down to the planet.”

Charlotte frowned.  “Unless they did interpret that as a hostile act,” she said.  “We don’t know they abandoned the sphere.  It’s just a theory.”

“No,” the captain agreed.  “But we are getting desperate.  If the second mission fails, what then?”

Chapter Twenty-Three: Shuttlecraft One, Dyson System (Interior)

“I fucked up,” Tobias said.  “I really should have jumped backwards when the captain asked for volunteers.”

Marigold gave him an odd look.  “You volunteered.”

“A moment of foolishness,” Tobias said.  “If I’d kept my mouth firmly shut ...”

He sighed, inwardly.  He wasn’t sure why he’d volunteered for the mission.  On one hand, he knew he was the best candidate; on the other, he knew there was a very good chance he’d get both of them killed.  He hadn’t expected Marigold to volunteer too ... he swallowed, hard, as she kept prepping her console.  Getting himself killed was bad enough, but at least Marigold would survive.  If he got them both killed, he’d never forgive himself.

No, his thoughts mocked.  You won’t be alive to forgive yourself.

He sighed, again.  The mission looked good, on paper.  He already knew the pseudogravity fields worked as advertised, at least when it came to hiding the shuttle from passive gravimetric sensors.  The reasoning for bending pseudogravity beams around the shuttle seemed workable, but he didn’t know.  The only way to find out was through trying and if they got it wrong, they’d be dead before they knew it.  They’d updated their suits and survival packs, and planned for a rough landing on the planetoid, but he didn’t need to run the simulations to know the odds weren’t in their favour.  The idea of trying to land in their suits struck him as madness. It made riding escape capsules look sane and reasonable instead of a very last resort.

Or something the rich and powerful do for fun, he thought, snidely.  It struck him as incredibly dangerous, but what did he know?  Perhaps there was a point when you were so rich and powerful you needed a higher class of expensive thrills.  We might make it down only to be trapped.  Again.

“You don’t have to ...”

Marigold cut him off.  “If you finish that sentence, I’ll bite next time.”

Tobias shut his mouth.  Marigold laughed.

“I know the risks,” she said.  “Have faith.  We can do it.”

“I hope so,” Tobias said.  “Do I get to say I told you so if we can’t?”

“If you can,” Marigold said.  “But only if you can.”

Tobias snorted.  If they were smashed to atoms, there wouldn’t be time to say anything.  He had no idea if there truly was an afterlife, but ... he shook his head as he checked his own console.  The live feed from the starship’s sensors was disconcerting.  The planetoid was surrounded by so many red icons he had the feeling they could simply jump from icon to icon until they reached the world itself.  But that wasn’t going to happen.

Of course not, he thought.  And this isn’t a game in which the massive enemy base is nothing more than a decoy, while your real target is elsewhere.

He took his seat and ran through the pre-flight checks.  Again.  The shuttle wasn’t anything like as heavily stealthed as the American craft, but if the boffins were right it shouldn’t matter.  The Builders used gravimetric sensors to track incoming objects – and ships – and as long as the pseudogravity field kept them hidden they should write off all other sensor reports as nothing more than isolated glitches.  Should.  Tobias had been cautioned that there was no such thing as a foolproof system, and declaring something foolproof was asking for trouble, but the Builders were a lot more advanced.  They might have a great deal more faith in their system’s ability to tell the difference between a random energy pulse – more common in outer space than most people understood – and an incoming enemy ship.  Hell, given that they were inside the sphere, random energy pulses might be rather thin on the ground.

“At least we won’t have a long crawl this time,” he muttered.  “We’ll be in the shit the moment we cross the line.”

He sighed, inwardly.  It was hard to care about the recordings, not when their lives were on the line.  The idea of schoolchildren listening to his grumblings made him smile.  If he was unlucky, the navy’s PR department would put together a biopic that had him played by a square-jawed actor, Marigold played by a girl with a bust size higher than her IQ and the shuttle itself looking like something out of a fantasy.  Any resemblance to reality would be purely coincidental.  Of course.  The idea wouldn’t be to tell the truth, but to encourage youngsters to join the navy.

A government advert that actually tells the truth?  The thought made him smile.  He could just imagine Sir Humphrey – the original or the remake – saying as much.  What an extraordinary idea!

Marigold closed the hatch.  “The systems all check out,” she said.  “Primary and secondary gravimetric generators are online, ready to go.”

Tobias swallowed.  The boffins hadn’t been able to tell them just how much of a margin for error they had.  Tobias was inclined to think they didn’t have one.  The navy might not notice a slight glitch in a laser net, a slight delay where there should be none, but the Builders might.  Gravity moved at the speed of light, but ... he shook his head.  There were too many ways to imagine the mission going horribly wrong.  If the Builders could monitor the pseudogravity beams in real time, the mission was doomed.  Probably.  The team exploring the first command centre, the one on the sphere, suggested the whole thing was something of an intelligence test.  If that were true, they might get through if they tried hard enough ...

Hah, he thought, darkly.  I tried my hardest at school and what did that get me?

A career, a girlfriend, a life, his thoughts answered.  It wasn’t a complete disaster, was it?

“I’m ready,” he said.  His hand ran down the console, bringing the drives online.  “Signal the ship.  Inform them we are ready to disconnect.”

His display lit up, revealing the minefield ahead.  His heart sank.  It felt as if he was back at school, trying to make his way from classroom to classroom without getting caught and beaten up by bullies.  No matter what he did, he was in the wrong.  He couldn’t run to the next class without being mocked and he couldn’t lag behind without being caught and caned for not getting to class on time.  Damn useless teachers.  Damn bullies ... he cursed under his breath as he studied the display.  They could get surprisingly close to the planetoid, unless something had changed, but the real test would come then.  And who knew what might be lurking on the planet itself?

“They’ve cleared us to go,” Marigold said.  “The hatches are closed and sealed.”

“Joy,” Tobias muttered.  “Here we go ...”

He keyed the console, lightly.  A low quiver ran through the shuttle as it disconnected itself from the mothership and headed towards the lone world.  The gravity field wavered, then died altogether.  Tobias felt his head swim and mentally kicked himself for not balancing the gravity field and then cancelling it before they left.  He should have expected it.  Last time, he’d had the entire flight to get used to the gradually reducing gravity field.

Marigold coughed.  “Excuse me.”

Tobias glanced at her.  “We can pause ...”

“Better to press on.”  Marigold swallowed, hard.  “I just wasn’t expecting the sudden shift in gravity.”

Tobias nodded.  It had felt as if they’d stepped onto a boat that had been making its way to the water.  The sense they would fall into the water had been overwhelming, even if it was nothing more than an illusion.  He shook his head, then glanced at her again.  She seemed to be fine.  Pity.  Part of him would have loved an excuse to turn back.

We didn’t feel sick in the zero g-spot hotel, he thought, with a flicker of amusement.  It was just incredibly hard to actually do the act without gravity.

He returned his attention to the display.  “We’ll cross the line in twenty minutes,” he said, carefully.  The line was about as solid as a schoolteacher’s promise to make sure a bully never bullied anyone again.  For all he knew, the automated defences already had a solid lock on the shuttle and were preparing a truly nasty surprise.  “And we’ll head straight to the planetoid.”

“Got it,” Marigold said.

Tobias shivered, feeling cold as the shuttle inched onwards.  It was hard, so hard, to disassociate himself, to pretend he was just playing a computer game.  He’d played quite a few where the enemy wouldn’t notice the player, as long as he didn’t do anything stupid ... he knew, deep inside, the real world wasn’t so obliging.  It was perfectly possible to do everything right and still lose.  The fists and weapons platforms came closer and closer, the former perfect spheres that both awed and terrified him.  The sheer power on display scared him to death.  The system was so advanced and yet it relied on kinetic projectiles to work ...

“No hint of detection,” Marigold said.

“Let’s keep our distance,” Tobias said.  His heart was beating like a drum.  “We don’t want to give them a clear shot at us.”

It was hard to think straight as they inched their way through the defences, his old snarky comments about fictional asteroid clusters coming back to haunt him.  He had the feeling the entire world was going to topple on top of him, burying him beneath a pile of debris ... as if he was standing at the bottom of a skyscraper and looking up and up.  It was another illusion, but it felt real.  Too real.

He shook his head.  It was absurd to think the shuttle had any gravity field worth the mention, certainly not one that could be easily detected.  One might as well expect to see tidal waves in a swimming pool.  But there were tidal effects in swimming pools, just too weak to be easily noticed.  He’d once heard a swimmer claim he’d been swimming against the tide, even though the swimming pool had been in Tunbridge Wells.  Absurd.  The idiot had been too stupid to come up with a good excuse for why he’d lost.

But the Builders can track stealthed probes and shuttles, he thought, numbly.  Just because we can’t do something doesn’t mean they can’t.

The seconds ticked past slowly as the shuttle glided on, trying to stay as far from the enemy structures as possible.  Tobias was fairly sure they were deluding themselves – the fists could cross a hundred kilometres in less than a second – but he clung to it anyway.  The craft neared the lone planet ...

“Contact,” Marigold snapped.  A shiver ran through the shuttle.  “We just crossed a pseudogravity beam!”

Tobias nearly wet himself.  If he hadn’t been so focused ...

“Compensate,” he snapped, although he knew it was too late.  They had to rely on the automatics and if they didn’t work ... he scowled, cursing the boffins under his breath.  They’d predicted the location of the beams to the best of their ability ... and gotten it wrong.  Badly wrong.  The beam they’d crossed was entirely in the wrong location.  The nasty part of his mind wondered if he should sue.  “Any enemy movements?”

“None,” Marigold said, after a moment.  “The beam appears unbroken, to them.”

Tobias frowned.  The beams weren’t intended for communications, as far as the boffins could tell, but any flickering within their structure should have raised alarms.  His lessons had covered old phones in which clicks and crackling noises on the line suggested someone was listening to the conversation and, for all he knew, the pseudogravity beams worked in similar ways.  It would be like shaking a branch while someone was sitting on it, then expecting them not to feel it.  And yet, it didn’t look as though anyone had noticed ...

“Keep an eye on it,” he ordered.  If that beam had been unexpected, how many others were there ahead, waiting for them?  “I feel like we’re picking our way across a minefield.”

“We are,” Marigold said, flatly.

Tobias gritted his teeth and pressed on, wishing he dared do it in a rush.  It was impossible.  They had only microseconds to adapt to the pseudogravity beams as they crossed them, one by one, and charging at the lone world would make detection certain.  He felt his nerves fray as they crossed more lines, each one out of place ... he made a mental note to suggest, next time, that the boffins flew on the shuttles.  It would give them more incentive to get it right, damn it!  He felt a nervous wreck when they finally reached standard orbit, for what it was worth on an unnaturally airless world, but there was no time to relax.  He steered the shuttle down, silently breathing a sigh of relief at how normal it was.  The planetoid was clearly an artefact in its own right, and it was also as unnatural as the artefacts they’d found during the war, but at least it looked like a planet.  The horizon wasn’t deceptive at all.

A low bump ran through the shuttle as it touched down.  “We made it!”

Marigold grinned, wanly.  Her eyes were tired and her face was streaked with sweat.  Tobias doubted he looked any better.  The flight had been nerve-wracking in a way he hadn’t felt since he’d first taken the helm, after weeks of training in the simulators.  They really had flown through a minefield – or, worse, picked their way over a frozen lake.  There was always a story or two, every winter, of someone who’d walked on the ice and fallen into the chilly water below.  Tobias had never dared, even before he’d become the school pariah.  It had always struck him as suicide. 

He staggered to his feet – the gravity was midway between Earth’s and Luna’s – and peered through the porthole.  The landscape was unnaturally flat; the sunlight was disturbingly bright, yet weirdly tinted in a way that sent chills down his spine.  They’d landed on a sheet of bronze metal ... he frowned, mentally adjusting his perspective.  His mind insisted there should be a sense of curvature, but there was none.  He shook his head.  The planetoid was smaller than the average Earth-type world, but not that much smaller.  To him, the horizon looked flat.

“Curious,” Marigold said.  “Can you see what’s missing?”

“Character?”  Tobias had been trained on the moon.  He’d seen the sights – and alien landscape.  There were even plans afoot to terraform the moon, although – privately – he doubted they’d ever get off the ground.  “Or ...”

It struck him, suddenly.  “No dust.”

“No,” Marigold agreed.  “Or anything, really.”

Tobias frowned.  The outer shell of the sphere was layered with dust, bearing mute testament to the sheer age of the alien megastructure.  Here ... his mind suggested a handful of explanations, each one more disturbing than the last.  There had to be some dust within the sphere itself, even before the fists had started smashing probes and shuttles.  Surely, some of the wreckage had fallen into the planetoid’s gravity well.  What had happened to it?  There was no atmosphere to burn it up, not here ...

“Signal the ship,” he said, finally.  “Tell them ... we have landed.”

“They’ll make it sound much more dramatic in the movie,” Marigold said.  “Won’t they?”

“Yeah.”  Tobias remembered his earlier thoughts and smiled.  “I dare say they will.”

He checked the display – they’d landed right next to the gravity twist – then went into the back to don his spacesuit.  The shipsuit was technically rated for airless environments, but the fabric was too fragile to offer much protection, no matter how many heating elements were worked into the material.  The spacesuit was uncomfortable, and he loathed it, yet it might just keep him alive.  Marigold shot him a nervous glance as he pulled the helmet over his head, her eyes grim.  Tobias understood.  They should have brought a third person with them, someone who could render assistance if they ran into trouble.  Instead, she had orders to do nothing if he wound up trapped, injured, or dead.

“I’ll keep the line hooked,” he said, as he stepped into the airlock.  “Wish me luck.”

The inner hatch closed behind him; the outer hatch opened a moment later.  Tobias stared at the eerie alien landscape.  He’d never quite understood, years ago, what was so special about being the first man to set foot on an alien world.  Neil Armstrong and his successors hadn’t been that special, not years after the human race had moved into space to stay.  Or so he’d thought.  He knew, now, that he’d been a fool.  They’d been more special than he’d known.

He hooked up the line, then stepped onto the alien metal.  It showed no reaction to his presence.  The world flowed away around him, so flat it was hard to comprehend.  He looked up and sucked in his breath.  He’d half-expected to see stars, or the alien objects high overhead, but instead the sky was awash in blue-green light.  The sphere’s surface, reflecting the sunlight onto the lone world.  It was ... alien.

“You have to see this,” he said.  “It’s ... awesome.”

“I will,” Marigold said.  “Can you see anything in the gravity twist?”

“No.”  Tobias inched forward, carefully.  “I can’t ...”

His foot skidded and he tripped, falling down into a pit that hadn’t been there a second ago.  The line tightened, stopping his fall even as the gravity twisted, slamming him into a wall ... no, a floor.  The gravity had shifted ... his head spun, remembering the time he’d studied fake Death Star blueprints.  The surface had been like a planet, the interior like a starship ... the Builders, he realised numbly, had taken the concept and made it real.  No wonder the gravity field had twisted.  The horizontal and the vertical had switched places.

“Tobias,” Marigold snapped.  “Where are you?”

“I think I’ve found the way in,” Tobias said.  It wasn’t easy to clamber back out, but he made it.  “And when reinforcements arrive, we’ll start exploring.”

Chapter Twenty-Four: The Lone Planetoid, Dyson System (Interior)

The shaft, Colin decided, was only dangerous if you were hooked to the shuttles outside.

It did require a leap of faith to jump through the hologram-concealed entrance and into the interior, but the gravity field somehow twisted and lowered you safely to the floor.  Or the deck.  Tobias had speculated the planetoid was actually a planet-sized starship and Colin was starting to wonder if he was right, despite the sheer insanity of such a project.  The Builders certainly seemed to think nothing of such vast projects ... hell, the old wet-navy supercarriers would have awed the navies that had fought the Battle of Trafalgar, let alone defeated the Spanish Armada.  The carriers would have seemed like impossible cities, monstrous creatures of metal ... even if the old sailors had understood they were ships, they’d be ships so far beyond their own that they just could not be matched.

He felt the gravity curve around him as he stepped over the hatch, his head spinning as he seemed to walk around an impossible corner like a physics-defying cartoon character.  Bugs Bunny had once joked that his stunts broke the law of gravity, but he’d never studied law; Colin wondered, as he made his way down the bronze corridor, if the Builders had the same casual disdain for the laws of physics.  But then, Neil Armstrong and his peers would have had a heart attack if they’d seen modern starships with their reactionless drives, casually pulling off feats that would have daunted one of the legendary flying saucers.  The word impossible, as the briefing officers had pointed out, was only a reflection of the unknown.

His suit seemed to tighten around him as the corridor widened suddenly.  They’d chosen to wear light suits, rather than protective gear or heavy armour, on the grounds they hadn’t encountered anything actively dangerous.  Colin suspected the environment was dangerous enough.  It might be possible to seal the tunnels – corridors – and pressurise them, but it would take a long time even if the local defences didn’t react badly.  He had no idea how to even begin calculating how long it would take, although he’d told the researchers it would take years when they’d thought to ask.  Hopefully, they wouldn’t do something stupid like removing their helmets in a vacuum.  It was supposed to be impossible, but Colin was starting to think the word had lost all meaning.

“Interesting,” Mansion said.

Colin tensed.  One of the boffins – who was currently back in the shuttles, probably writing an angry complaint to the admiral – had used a microburst transmitter on the surface, something that had nearly made Colin wet himself.  He’d been sure their next moments would be their last, as the transmission drew fists to swat them from the planetoid, but nothing had happened.  Colin had risked using two more transmissions to confirm they didn’t draw fire, then cautioned the team to make sure they used them as little as possible, outside the alien megastructure.  The Builders might not have wanted the fists accidentally bashing the planetoid, as the idiot who’d made the first transmission had argued, but it was equally possible they’d missed the first signal.  There was no point in taking chances when you didn’t have to.  Colin’s team were already setting up shielded cables as they probed deeper into the structure.

“That’s not quite the word I would have chosen,” Colin muttered.  The passive ECM sensors they’d laid outside the concealed entrance hadn’t picked up any transmissions, when they’d used microbursts within the planetoid, but he wasn’t reassured.  The Builders might have accidentally blinded themselves, when they’d lined their bulkheads with something that blocked radio transmissions, yet it was just as possible they’d laid sensors within the planetoid too.  “Do you think we’re being herded in a very specific direction?”

Mansion walked past him, his suit’s flashlights lighting up the interior.  The planetoid’s lighting came and went at unpredictable intervals, causing panic at first and then annoyance.  Colin was starting to think they were insects, crawling across something so vast as to be completely beyond their comprehension.  Or ... he wondered, suddenly, if they were exploring a powerless starship hulk, stripped of everything that had once made the vessel go.  If they didn’t understand the tech, if they didn’t understand how it worked, how long would it take to realise it was gone?  Or ...

“I think there’s no way to step through an airlock on a human starship and find yourself on the bridge,” Mansion said.  The American kept inching down the corridor, as if he didn’t have a care in the world.  “For all we know, we’re still in the alien airlock.”

He sounded oddly amused.  “I’ve got the feeling the Builders weren’t humanoid,” he added, thoughtfully.  “We don’t build airlocks to be disconcerting.  They might not have found their airlock very disconcerting at all.”

Colin had to admit the American had a point.  He was used to risky flying, and low-orbital insertions that could easily end with him smashed against the ground, but commercial airliners and starships didn’t force their passengers to go through hell before they reached their destination.  They worked hard to make it as safe and comfortable as possible.  The Builders might not have been particularly bothered by curving gravity fields, while humans found them unnatural.  Or ... they might just expect their visitors to make a leap of faith.  Tobias had noted, rather crossly, that he might not have been hurt if he’d trusted the alien system and not kept his link to the shuttle.

The hours wore on.  The teams probed further into the interior.  Drones were launched into the vacuum, scouting out the terrain, only to fail as soon as they passed out of sight.  Colin didn’t understand it, but ... he scowled as he drew out a map on his notepad.  It was difficult to tell if Mansion was right, he decided.  On one hand, they were putting together a map of the interior.  On the other, saying they’d barely scratched the surface was a gross exaggeration.  It was like a man visiting New York City.  He could not say, afterwards, he knew America.

“Curious,” Mansion said.  “There’s a pattern to the corridors that makes little sense.”

“It’s more like tunnels than starship corridors,” Colin agreed.  Endeavour had tubes and maintenance sections that were sealed off from the rest of the ship – it was at least theoretically possible for someone to stow away in those sections, although the crew knew every last nook and cranny and could search the ship from top to bottom very quickly if they had a reason to look – but the planetoid’s interior felt more like tunnels drilled through rock than something put together from scratch.  “I wonder ...”

He broke off as the corridor widened suddenly.  The lights went out a second later, all of the lights.  He swore under his breath.  Being trapped in darkness was no fun, certainly not on an alien artefact of unknown design.  He poked his suit’s flashlights and cursed, again, as they refused to work.  A flash of hot anger ran through him.  The aliens were screwing with them, deliberately.  It was suddenly impossible to believe they were dealing with automatic defences ...

He forced himself to stay still.  Mansion was dead ahead of him ... right?  He inched forward and felt nothing.  The researcher should have the smarts to stay still, surely?  Colin had no idea what sort of trap they’d triggered, if indeed it was a trap and not something that should have been harmless, but they knew the procedure.  The people behind them should be reacting now ... if they could.  Had the power gone out everywhere?  He took a deep shuddering breath.  How long did they have, if the power was completely out?  Not long.

... The world shifted around him.  He was standing in front of a middle-aged woman, shouting at her as she cowered in front of him.  His fists lashed out and struck her, sending her crashing to the floor.  Rage boiled through him, vast incoherent rage.  He woke up early and went to work and worked all day to feed and clothe his wife and kids, yet the silly bitch couldn’t even keep a clean house!  Nag, nag, nag ... that was all she did, demanding more from him and giving little in return.  The urge to hurt her swelled within him.  It would be so easy to beat her to a pulp, then fuck her senseless.  He wanted to punish her ...

... His kids were shouting at him.  The son, an effeminate fop who would be murdered in secondary school if he didn’t man up; the daughter, her face as disdainful as her mother’s, even as a little girl.  He pitied the man who married her... no, the man who let her trap him into marriage, to find himself a slave, working his arse off for a woman who didn’t appreciate him and probably cheated on him.  His hand rose, almost of its own accord.  They both needed a thrashing now, before it was too late.  His son had to man up.  His daughter had to know her place.  A good beating never hurt anyone.  His father had always said as much and the old bastard had been right ...

No, he thought.  This was wrong.  This was all wrong.  He wasn’t married, not to ... he stared at the bruised woman, wondering who she was.  And the kids ... they weren’t his kids and yet they were oddly familiar.  What is this?

He saw it suddenly, in a moment of clear insight.  It was his family.  His mother, lying on the floor; his sister and himself, screaming at their father to stop.  Just stop.  The old bastard had thrashed them, both of them ... he shuddered, the memory so powerful it felt real even though he knew it was not.  His father had been a bastard, and Colin had felt the back of the old man’s hand more than once, but this ... it was a fear, not a reality.  It was ... he gritted his teeth and forced himself to walk forward.  The memory came apart in front of him ...

... And the real world returned.

Colin staggered, as if the gravity had suddenly grown stronger.  The memory – the nightmare – felt so real, so painfully real.  He had struck his wife ... what wife?  His mother?  He’d feared, deep inside, that he might become his father, that he might treat his children the way his father had treated him.  The memory hurt.  Objectively, he knew what he’d been doing – what his father had been doing – was wrong.  Subjectively, he’d been so deeply buried in the old man’s mindset that it was hard to convince himself he was wrong.  His life had cut him to the quick and his wife and kids had been no help.

He looked up.  The lighting was back.  Mansion was on his knees in front of him, gloved hands covering his helmet.  Colin started forward, helping the scientist to his feet and yanking him forward.  The chamber opened in front of them, revealing a complicated orrery of lights spinning through the air above them.  He realised, as sweat trickled down his back, that it had been another test.  The alien defences had reached into their heads, found their worst nightmares, and made them real.  Or real enough.  He hated to think the Builders were powerful enough to alter reality on a whim.

“Fuck,” Mansion muttered.  The American sounded badly shaken.  “It was ...”

“They dug up our worst nightmares and threw them at us,” Colin said.  He wondered how he was going to write that in his report.  Would the analysts think the aliens really were telepaths?  Or, more likely, they’d keyed their defences to produce hallucinations and let the victim’s subconscious do the rest.  Colin had had a bad trip once that had come very close to killing him.  The alien defences were worse.  “Odd, don’t you think?”

He tongued his mouthpiece, making a quick report as Mansion surveyed the chamber.  If the nightmare field was designed to deter visitors, it had been a little overdesigned.  He hadn’t had any sense he could step back and escape, not as soon as the visions had overwhelmed him.  Perhaps it was intended to keep him prisoner, locked in his own mind, until the designers could come and arrest him.  He scowled.  His palm itched, as if he’d truly hit someone.  He shuddered, helplessly, as he finished his report.  It had felt so real.

“I had the opportunity to cheat on a test,” Mansion commented, grimly.  “I never did.  But I did.”

“It wasn’t real,” Colin said.  It seemed a little unfair.  He was presented with his worst nightmare – becoming his father – and Mansion had cheated on a test?  “It just felt real.”

Mansion laughed, weakly.  “You’d better warn the others,” he said.  “And then rig up ropes so we can pull people through the babble zone.”

Colin blinked.  “What?”

“The babble zone,” Mansion explained.  “Doctor Cozort came up with” – he made a very visible decision to avoid technobabble – “a device that projects a warning sensation, then bathes you in hallucinations until you back off.  It was originally devised as a crowd control device, but the risk of accidentally killing someone was way too high.  The results couldn’t always be predicted, either.  Some of the test subjects had heart attacks.  Others thought the hallucinations were real and attacked them.  A handful even ...”

He snorted.  “Brief exposure is unpleasant, but not fatal.  Long-term exposure can be fatal.  But there’s nothing physical standing between you and whatever is on the other side of the zone.  All you have to do is push through, which sounds easy until you actually do it.”

Colin frowned.  “Can the effect be blocked?”

“Not easily,” Mansion said.  “It wasn’t my department.  You might have to send a message home.”

“I see.”  Colin felt oddly better, knowing the effect wasn’t beyond human technology.  It was the first step towards making it comprehensible.  “Were you meant to know about it?”

Mansion didn’t answer.  Colin smiled inwardly, then made a second report as the scientist kept walking around the chamber.  The babble zone was unpleasant, to say the least, but they could easily find out if a proper spacesuit provided protection or simply rig up ropes to drag someone though the zone as quickly as possible.  Or ... he allowed himself a moment to clear his mind, reminding himself – once again – that the babble zone memories were nothing more than an extremely unpleasant dream – and then looked up at the lights.  It took him longer than it should, he acknowledged sourly, before realising it was an alien tactical display.

“Look at the lines,” Mansion said.  “What do you make of them?”

Colin frowned.  He’d hoped the rest of the team would join them in a hurry, but they were still getting the equipment they needed to slip through the babble zone while keeping their exposure as limited as possible.  He felt uncomfortably trapped.  It would be easy to walk out of the chamber, but it would mean going through the babble zone and he couldn’t face it.  Not again.  His old memories of taunting his schoolmates for being cowards mocked him.  He could walk to the front – advance to ambush, as the old hands called it – without a qualm, but going back through the babble zone unmanned him.  It was ...

He shook his head and turned his attention to the display, hoping to distract himself.  The more he looked at it, the more detail he saw.  The lines weren’t entirely random – there was a pattern, he was sure, even if he couldn’t pick it out – but they were difficult to understand.  They seemed to radiate out from empty space, as if someone had sketched out pencil lines to guide their paintbrush and then erased them ... not, he recalled sourly, that he’d ever enjoyed art at school.  He hadn’t been very good at it, either.

“I think the blank spot is where we are,” Mansion said.  “The lone world.  We’ll have to check, just to be sure, but I think the lines represent pseudogravity beams radiating out of the planetoid.  The patterns are odd.”

“How so?”

“The Builders use intersecting beams of pseudogravity to push the fists around the system,” Mansion said.  “There are at least two beams and perhaps more ... here, though, we only see one.  I think ...”

“There may be other transmitters elsewhere,” Colin pointed out.  The sphere was huge.  There was no reason there couldn’t be a second planetoid, although he found it hard to believe something that size could remain unnoticed.  “Or we could have misunderstood what we were seeing ...”

“It’s possible,” Mansion agreed.  “And why did they show us this chamber?”

Colin glanced at him.  “You think they wanted us here?”

“I don’t know,” Mansion said.  “We’re dealing with an alien mindset.  This might be instantly comprehensible to one of them, but not to us.”

“Just because I speak English doesn’t mean I understand technobabble,” Colin said.  It had been a minor frustration, back at school, when he’d tried to read material written by academics for other academics.  He’d been told it was worse if one went to university.  The academics insisted they spoke English, but Colin was sure they didn’t.  “They might not have understood it either.”

“Maybe,” Mansion said.  He reached out towards a line that reached across the chamber and beyond.  “I think this one might represent the tramline itself.  It might ...”

His fingers touched the line.  A faint tremor ran through the planetoid.  The line vanished.

Colin stared.  “What ...?”

“I thought it was a hologram,” Mansion said, shocked.  Colin had thought the same.  It hadn’t occurred to him that they could actually touch the lines.  “It ... I felt something!”

Colin had an awful thought.  He hoped to hell he was wrong.

He wasn’t.

Chapter Twenty-Five: HMS Endeavour, Dyson System (Interior)

Staci had been asleep when the alarms started to howl.

She jumped out of her makeshift cot, grabbed her jacket with one hand and her helmet with the other and practically ran to the bridge.  The captain was not supposed to show any hint of concern, even if an entire alien fleet was bearing down on them with murderous intent, but there was no way she could force herself to walk when enemy projectiles could be flashing towards her at impossible speeds.  Being inside the sphere might protect them from some threats, but not from others.  The fists moved so rapidly they could smash the ship to atoms before she knew she was under attack.

“Report,” she snapped, as the hatch snapped closed behind her.  There were no red icons on the display, no warning enemy forces were about to do their level best to kill them ... a relief, perhaps, although she didn’t dare relax.  The alarms wouldn’t have gone off for nothing.  “Yang?”

Helen Yang stood.  The sensor officer had been standing watch ... it should have been an easy watch, even though they were holding position near the lone world.  Staci wondered, too late, if that had been a mistake.  She owed it to her subordinates to make sure they got experience standing watch, holding command when there was a reasonable chance nothing would happen to force them to act.  But the sphere was dangerously unpredictable.  She had been sleeping right next to the bridge, yet ... it might have been a mistake.  There was no point in worrying about it now.

“Captain, the gravimetric sensors ... ah, the sensors reported the tramline vanished,” Helen said, in the tone of someone who knew she wouldn’t be believed.  Or someone who hadn’t quite wrapped her mind around what had happened.  “It’s gone.”

Staci found it hard to wrap her head around it too.  “Turn off the alarms,” she ordered, keeping her voice calm.  There was no point in waking the entire crew, although that probably couldn’t be helped now.  “And then make your report.  Calmly, if possible.”

Helen flushed, but shut off the alarms before speaking.  Staci allowed herself a moment of relief.  The alarms were meant to get everyone out of their bunks and rushing to their duty stations, jerking them awake no matter how deeply they’d slept, but ... it was always unpleasant.  Helen would get a lot of ribbing from the other senior officers and probably complaints from the diplomats ... Staci made a mental note to ensure the latter got passed to her, so she could tell them to stick their complaints where the sun didn’t shine.  It was better to take a false alarm seriously than ignore a real alarm.

“We were keeping an eye on the tramline, through passive gravimetric sensors,” Helen reported.  She glanced at the display, as if she expected the tramline to snap back into existence.  “It just ... vanished, as if someone had clicked a switch.  There’s no report from Dasher or Daring yet, but ...”

“We might not get a FLASH message, not yet,” Staci finished.  The time delay was working against them, again.  It was worse now.  The destroyers and the rest of the flotilla might assume their sensors were having flights of fancy and waste time checking and rechecking their systems.  A dull wash of something – she refused to call it panic – ran through her.  It would be better, far better, for their sensors to be fucked than ... than their only way out of the sphere vanishing, as if it had never been.  “Signal them anyway; ask them to confirm.”

“Aye, Captain,” Helen managed.  Endeavour would probably get the alert signal from Dasher before her signal reached the destroyers, but it didn’t matter.  The Royal Navy was practiced at sorting out such minor issues.  “I ... what’ll we do?”

“Good question,” Staci said.  She was surprised it had been asked, even though survey crews were much more relaxed about such matters than warships.  Helen had had a nasty shock.  It wouldn’t take long before it dawned on Staci herself that the world had just turned upside down.  “We’ll think of something.”

The thought haunted her as she took her chair and waited.  The display resolutely refused to reboot and show the missing tramline.  Staci hadn’t expected it, but still ... she cursed under her breath as the message from Dasher arrived, passing Endeavour’s message in transit.  The tramline was truly gone.  Staci ordered the sensor crews to check and recheck their gear, more as busywork to keep their minds off what had happened than anything else.  One sensor developing glitches was hardly surprising, all of them developing the same problem at the same time was ... vanishingly small.  The survey ships were designed to keep their sensor networks decentralised.  They couldn’t be crippled without destroying the entire ship. 

“Signal from Cousteau,” MacPhee reported.  “She confirms the missing tramline and requests orders.”

Staci scowled.  The risk of being trapped inside the sphere had seemed minimal.  The tramline linking Dyson One and Two wasn’t an enhanced tramline, as far as they’d been able to tell.  Had they been wrong?  Binary systems were rare and no one had ever quite figured out why the tramlines existed in the first place.  It was possible ... she wondered, suddenly, if the tramline leading out of the system was gone too.  Admiral He and his subordinates, outside the sphere, might be trapped too.  Or wondering what the hell they should do.

Here’s hoping they can get back home, Staci thought.  There was enough raw material in the outer system to sustain a civilisation, but ... were there enough people?  Hell, were there enough people inside the sphere?  What’ll we do if we can’t get out?

“Forward the message to the admiral,” she ordered, finally.  The shock was starting to sink in, clouding her thoughts.  She might never see her homeworld again.  Or her family.  Or ... or everything.  Death was an occupational hazard, but being trapped hundreds of light years from home was new.  The tramlines had seemed permanent.  “And send a message to the landing party.  Ask them ... ask them what the hell they did.”

“Aye, Captain.”

Staci leaned back in her chair, her mind racing.  Endeavour was designed for long-term missions.  So were the other survey ships.  They’d also brought vast amounts of supplies, trade goods and fabbers with them.  There was no immediate danger of starvation, or a steady stream of breakdowns that would eventually render the flotilla worse than useless and force the crews to evacuate to the sphere, but ... given time, the shortages would start to mount up and all hell would break loose.  The thought chilled her.  She didn’t want to spend the rest of her days amongst the natives, amongst humans who didn’t know the first thing about the universe around them, amongst humans who were penned up in a trap they had no hope of escaping.  How could they?  They didn’t even see the prison bars!

Her intercom bleeped.  “Captain,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “Will you join us for a meeting at 1000?”

Staci scowled.  A meeting?  What did the Admiral think a meeting could accomplish?  They didn’t have the first idea of what had happened, let alone how to resolve it.  The tramline was gone.  They had no idea, either, of what was happening outside the sphere.  The shell was relatively thin, but it was tough.  Her ship’s weapons couldn’t even scratch the sphere.  And trying would probably get them destroyed by the automated defences.

She took a moment to compose herself.  1000.  Three hours away.  She could have a shower and a cup of coffee and a quiet think ... who knew?  Maybe the tramline would return, as quickly and inexplicably as it had vanished.  Or ... she groaned, inwardly, as she realised word would already be spreading amongst the crew.  How long would it be, she asked herself, before disbelief was replaced by panic?  The crew hadn’t signed up for a one-way mission either.  They’d all thought they’d be able to go home. 

“Yes, Admiral,” she said, finally.  God knew what the admiral was doing.  Perhaps he was just pretending everything was normal, simply because he didn’t know what else to do.  “I’ll be there.”

***

Charlotte had never really given much thought to the sheer size of interplanetary and interstellar space.  Her early life had been resolutely planet-bound, where an hour or two would suffice to get from one place on the planet to another, and even when she’d been sent into de facto exile she’d never taken the time to contemplate just how vast the distance was between Earth and Dyson.  Sure, it took months to get there and back, but so what?  It wasn’t as if she needed to be somewhere urgently.

She felt ice congeal in her stomach as she studied the star chart that, for the first time ever, showed no tramlines.  The shell was an insurmountable obstacle, at least at the moment, but the interstellar gulf was far – far – worse.  Endeavour was supposed to be able to reach 0.2C in realspace, which meant she’d take at least a hundred years to reach the nearest colony and much longer to return to Earth.  Charlotte was no expert, but she feared that was ludicrously optimistic.  If the drives failed in transit, the starship would be stranded and helpless.  The days she’d spent on the sphere, fearing she’d never see Earth again, haunted her.  They might have no choice, but to evacuate to the sphere before the life support ran out and hope for the best.

Her face was a mask as she strolled down the corridor to the admiral’s suite and keyed the buzzer.  The handful of crewmen she saw looked as if they didn’t believe the news or were absolutely stunned, unable to wrap their heads around what had happened.  She didn’t blame them.  The thought of never seeing her daughters again ... she swallowed, hard, as it dawned on her she’d never attend their weddings, never be the proud grandmother, never spoil the grandkids rotten, never do any of the other things she’d assumed she’d do in her future as a matter of course.  She would never see anyone again, if they weren’t already inside the sphere.  Hell, Admiral He and the rest of the flotilla were trapped outside.  If that tramline was gone too ...

We don’t know, she told herself, as the admiral’s hatch hissed open.  And there’s nothing we can do about it either.

“Ambassador,” Admiral Dismukes said.  His aide brought them coffee, then retreated as silently as she’d come.  “Thank you for coming.”

Charlotte nodded, tersely.  The diplomatic staff hadn’t quite realised what had happened ... not yet.  They weren’t spacers.  They didn’t understand the tramlines ... not completely.  It would take time for them to realise and react ... what could she say or do, she asked herself, that would make it better?  She was lucky, in one respect.  She had no lover waiting for her back home.  The rest of the staff weren’t so lucky.

At least I saw the girls grow into their teens, she told herself.  Captain Templeton and Doctor Gaur entered, their faces grim.  I will have that, at least, to comfort me.

“Please, be seated,” Admiral Dismukes said.  He sat himself, schooling his expression into a mask.  “It has been confirmed by each and every ship in the sphere.  The tramline has gone.  I’ve got ships scanning for possible alternate tramlines – the primary is massive enough, we think, to have a second or even a third low-grade tramline – but so far we’ve drawn a blank.  We have to assume the worst.”

“That we’re stuck here,” Staci said, flatly.  “Trapped.”

Charlotte swallowed.  She’d known what it meant, but hearing it put so bluntly was ...

Admiral Dismukes leaned forward.  “We did have a very interesting report from the planetoid,” he said.  “Doctor?”

Athena looked so calm Charlotte knew she was angry.  “The exploration team discovered, after some difficulty, an alien command centre.  Or something along those lines.  One of those researchers touched what he thought was a hologram, one representing the tramline.  It vanished – and so did the tramline.  I checked the timing and they both happened at the exact same moment.  How that happened, I don’t know.”

“Fucking careless,” Admiral Dismukes snarled.  “Why ...?”

“His report makes it clear he thought it was a hologram,” Athena said.  “He also thinks it was solid, although we have been reluctant to risk touching anything else.  Given time, we may find a way to reactivate the tramline.”

“Which was clearly artificial,” Staci said, slowly.  “Did he turn off the other tramline?  The one leading back home?”

Athena shrugged.  “There’s no way to say.  Our best models disagree on precisely how the presence of two stars, both effectively identical in mass, affects the tramlines.  Some argue the tramlines come and go as the stars rotate around the barycentre, others that the build-up of gravity wells prohibits the development of stable tramlines.  The Builders certainly did something to extend the tramline, but what?  The hell of it, admiral, is that the one tramline that should be natural is the one we know got turned off.”

“Fuck.”  Admiral Dismukes stared at the hologram for a long cold moment.  “Do you think there’s a chance the researchers can turn the tramline on again?”

“We don’t know,” Athena said.  “Right now, we’re effectively pushing buttons at random.  I’ve given orders that there are to be no further experiments, at least until we have a better idea of how the system works.  We should be able to unlock it, given time.”

“How long?”

Charlotte cleared her throat.  “Admiral, there’s no way to predict something like that.  It might be tomorrow.  It might be a thousand years from now.”

“I know.”  Admiral Dismukes made a visible effort to control himself.  “What else can we do?”

“Explore the other command centre too,” Staci put in.  “It’s very close to the north mountain and the hatch.  The hatch that leads right out of the sphere.  If we could open it, somehow ... sir, for all we know, the hinges could be blown off even if the doors themselves are indestructible.”

Charlotte frowned.  “How can you be sure?”

“I can’t,” Staci said.  “There was an intelligence and adaptability test we went through at the academy.  We were told to get through a metal door.  Trying to break the door down was an exercise in futility, while picking the lock was impossible.  It turned out the trick was to take off the hinges.  With a little imagination, you could use the tools you were given to do it.”

The admiral looked ready to clutch at any straws.  “Redeploy half the research team to that centre,” he ordered.  “Have the engineer inspect the hatches and look for places we can lay charges.  The airlock might be weaker than the rest of the sphere ...”

His lips twisted into a faint smile.  “Perhaps we can lure a fist to smash the airlock and let us out.”

Athena frowned.  “Admiral, with all due respect, that might set off a chain reaction that would destroy the entire sphere.”

Admiral Dismukes scowled.  “How?”

“The sphere is not a natural environment,” Athena said.  “The shell shouldn’t even have a gravity field, but they gave it one.  We don’t know what will happen if the sphere gets struck by a fist.  We could wind up murdering every last person on the sphere.”

They’ll call us worse than Hitler, or Stalin, or Mao, or Javier, Charlotte thought, numbly.  It was difficult – impossible – to wrap her head around just how many millions of people humanity’s worst monsters had killed, directly or indirectly.  There could be trillions of humans and aliens on the sphere, all certainly doomed if the sphere started to shatter.  We can’t take the risk.  Not with so many lives at stake.

She swallowed.  They normally use such charges as a way to smear their target, her thoughts mocked.  But this time the accusation will be thoroughly deserved.

The admiral said nothing for a moment, then nodded.  “We will try to open the hatch,” he said.  “If that fails, and we are unable to restore the tramline elsewhere, we may have to consider desperate measures.”

“But not at the expense of billions of lives,” Charlotte said, quietly.  “Admiral ...”

She let her voice trail off, unable to think of the words.  It would be a crime beyond all comprehension.  It would be a deed that would overshadow the worst of the worst, an act ... to call it a crime against humanity would be to understate the case.  She’d heard rumours about secret protocols to allow genocide to be carried out, if the human race was presented with a flat choice between eradicating an irredeemably hostile alien race or being exterminated by them, but nothing concrete.  Even if those rumours were accurate, the human race wasn’t at stake.  It was just their chance to return home.

“If we cannot open the hatch, or find some other way out, we will need to settle on the sphere,” the admiral said, quietly.  “But I intend to explore all possible options before we give up and settle down.”

“I think there will be options,” Athena said.  “The sphere’s command centres do seem to be something of an intelligence test.  We’ve had some luck using computers to crack their puzzles and unlock their higher functions.  Cheating, technically, but who cares?”

“Not me,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “If it gets us out of here, and back in touch with Earth, I don’t care.  We can worry about proving we’re not a grievously savage race later.”

Maybe that’s the point, Charlotte thought.  The Builders want to see if we’ll sentence uncounted billons to death just to make our escape.

“Yes, sir,” Staci said.  She sounded relieved.  Perhaps she’d had the same thought.  “With your permission, I’ll get the ball rolling.”

“Please,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “And if any of you feel like praying, do it now.”

Chapter Twenty-Six: PS Pennyfathing/USS Curtis/Nanchang, Dyson System (Exterior)

The air smelled.  Dorothy didn’t want to think of what.

She cursed savagely – there was no point in keeping her voice down, even though they were trying to hide – as she scowled at the passive sensor display.  It had seemed like a brilliant idea, when they’d first heard about the shattered Dyson Sphere.  The chance to find something – anything – they could use to pay off their loans on Pennyfathing was not to be missed, even if it risked landing them in real trouble.  Legally, it shouldn’t – they’d set out before the Great Powers could declare an exclusion zone around the sphere, and the Belt Alliance had never signed the treaty – but she doubted it would matter.  By the time they worked their complaints through the courts, the Great Powers would have sealed up the sphere and started charging admittance.  The only hope of them making money lay in getting to the shattered sphere first and finding something they could sell.  They could have done it too ...

We got greedy, she thought, sourly.  They could have left the sphere before the MNF arrived but no, they’d had to keep poking through the rubble.  And now they’re looking for us.

She studied the passive display, watching the two red icons as they picked their way through the debris field.  The gunboats had caught a sniff of Pennyfathing somehow, even though the tiny freighter had had nearly everything powered down from the moment they’d first detected the gunboats.  She was pretending to be a hole in space, an act that should have caused the Americans to overlook her.  And yet, they were still running a search pattern.  She had no idea what they’d sniffed, and they might have just gotten very lucky, but it didn’t matter.  They might just stumble across her ...

It isn’t the active ships that are the real threat, she reminded herself.  It’s the powered-down gunboats that might be lurking in the shadows, ready to pounce.

Her eyes lingered on the display.  She didn’t like Americans – or British, French, Russians or Chinese – but she had to admit they were good.  They didn’t have the time to examine every last piece of junk, and there was a reasonable chance they’d overlook Pennyfathing, yet they were trying to spook her into flight or surrender.  They might get their wish, too.  The atmosphere was starting to grow stale, suggesting the tiny crew were on the verge of suffocating in their own waste products.  She had the tools to recycle the air, and turn their crap into something they could eat, but she didn’t dare.  The Americans were too close.  A single emission, even something as minor as an unshielded VR system, might draw the gunboats to Pennyfathing like flies to shit.

Of course, if we keep smelling our own farts, we’re probably going to surrender soon anyway, she thought.  Or the Yanks will think we’re throwing chemical weapons at them and open fire.

The hatch behind her opened.  She glanced back as Peter glided onto the bridge.  “Yes?”

“We have a problem.”  Peter spoke with quiet urgency.  “A big one.”

“Really?”  Dorothy pointed at the display.  “And there I was thinking we were enjoying a trouble-free life.”

She was in the mood for an argument.  Peter could normally be counted upon to give as good as he got.  But now he seemed too worried to take the bait.

“The tramline has vanished,” he said.  “It’s gone.”

“What?”  Dorothy couldn’t believe her ears.  Forget the argument ... if this was his idea of a joke, she’d bundle him out the airlock personally and swear blind it had been a terrible accident.  “Are you mad?”

“I was plotting a course back home,” Peter said.  “I figured we could inch out ... it doesn’t matter now.  We could always see the tramlines on the passive systems, right?  Well, we can’t now!”

Dorothy shook her head.  “The system is fucked.”

Her console bleeped.  The American gunboats had reversed course and were heading back to their mothership with all the unseemly haste of a bully who’d discovered – too late - that his victim had a much bigger and nastier brother.  She stared, not quite believing her eyes.  The Americans wouldn’t waste their time playing games, would they?  It was insane.  Did they think she’d break cover?  But if the tramline was gone, there was nowhere to run.

“Impossible,” she said.  “Are you ... are you sure?”

“I checked the sensors as best as I could, without using anything that might betray us,” Peter told her.  “They’re working.  The tramline is gone.”

Dorothy sucked in her breath.  She’d been born and raised in the Belt and she had no ties to Earth – personally, she thought the wretched groundhogs should stay on their worlds and leave space to the spacers – but ... how could she get back to her homeport?  The asteroid was hundreds of light years away ... right now, it might as well be on the other side of the universe.  There was no way she could get there without a tramline.  Her ship was designed for long voyages – private spacers tended to head beyond the rim, all too aware the bigger shipping lines made life harder for them – but ... now there was no way home.  It was no consolation to know everyone else was in the same boat.  If the tramline was gone, they were fucked.

“Incredible,” she muttered.  The Americans were well out of passive sensor range now.  She could only see them because they weren’t trying to hide.  “If we slip away ...”

She keyed her console, using the gas jets to steer them away from the debris cloud and across the shattered sphere.  They could pretend to be a chunk of rubble long enough to escape ... her mind caught up a moment later.  Escape ... escape where?  In theory, they could maintain themselves for quite some time; in practice, sooner or later, they would run short of something and die.  Unless they made common cause with everyone else ... what happened?  How did an entire tramline just vanish?

“Yeah,” Peter said, echoing her thoughts.  “Where do we go?”

Dorothy had no answer.  Normally, they could slip into interplanetary space, intersect the tramline, jump out and make their way home.  Now ... there was nowhere to go.  The binary star system was both huge and confining, unpopulated and yet teeming with life.  It was ... absurd.

“I don’t know,” she said.  “I guess we’ll just have to wait and see.”

***

Captain Hector Howard, USN, had been privately surprised Admiral He hadn’t insisted on flying his flag on Curtis, although he was too relieved to worry about it much.  The gunboat carrier was hardly unique – the Chinese had their own gunboats and gunboat carriers – but there was classified technology onboard, as well as all the other problems that came from playing host to an admiral.  And he’d yet to meet an admiral who didn’t demand to fly on the biggest ship in the flotilla.  The only reason Admiral Dismukes flew his flag on Endeavour was that she was going to jump into the sphere.  The admiral had insisted on sharing the risks.

Right now, Hector rather wished he hadn’t.

His sensor crews hadn’t believed their own reports, not at first.  Tramlines didn’t just vanish.  They were beams of raw gravitational force, formed between two stars ... they just didn’t blink out of existence.  But two tramlines – the one leading into the sphere and the one heading back home – were no longer there.  It was impossible.  Admiral He had deployed scouts to see if other tramlines had formed, replacing them, but so far they’d drawn a blank. 

The tramline was extended, somehow, he thought, morbidly.  His father had served on USS Eisenhower, during the raid that had ended the Second Interstellar War, and he’d used a catapult to travel into the enemy rear, which meant they’d had to conquer or die.  Maybe they just turned it off.

He scowled as he turned to study the display.  The sphere was still there, still a brooding immense mass that dominated the entire system.  It was hard, sometimes, to wrap his head around just how large it was, how it really was a solid wall blocking his flight to the other star.  He had the starship officer’s tendency to think planets small ... there was no way he could think that of the sphere.  It was just too big.  He’d been down to the surface and discovered it flipped between being a barrier and a planet in its own right.  An immense planet.

The intercom bleeped.  “Sir?”

“Come,” Hector ordered.

Ensign Sally Fletcher stepped into the compartment.  “Sir,” she said.  “The scouts just completed their survey of the system.  They found no tramlines leading into the sphere or out of the system.”

Her voice quivered.  She was barely leaving her teens ... so young, Hector thought, that she really shouldn’t be on a deep-space mission.  Someone had probably pulled strings on her behalf, perhaps assuming the exploration mission would be less dangerous than patrolling the Infected Zone and eradicating what was left of the virus.  If that was true ... they’d sent the young woman to a fate worse than death.  Hector wondered if she’d realised the true implications yet.  Curtis couldn’t travel FTL on her own.  She needed the tramlines and they were gone.  Earth might as well be on the other side of the galaxy, for all their hopes of returning home.

“I see,” he said, finally.  She hadn’t realised, not yet, that Admiral He was just playing for time.  A tramline capable of getting them out of the system would have been found very quickly, if it existed.  “And I take it there have been no communications from the sphere?”

“No, sir,” Sally said.

Hector nodded.  It was a pointless question.  “Return to your duties,” he said, levelly.  “Dismissed.”

He turned away as she left, returning his attention to the hologram.  Admiral Dismukes was inside the sphere, trapped.  Hector liked to think they could dig into the sphere and open a way for the trapped humans to escape, but it was wishful thinking.  The sphere was improbably thin, yet it didn’t matter.  Whatever it was made of was strong enough to resist everything the fleet could throw at it.  And that meant ... he snorted.  The admiral might be the lucky one.  The outsiders had enough supplies to support themselves for a time, but if they didn’t manage to set up a working biosphere they were doomed to a slow, lingering death.  It was lucky they had the supplies to build a space habitat.  But without hope of resupply ...

If we don’t hang together, we’ll hang separately, he thought.  His eyes sought out Nanchang, holding position near the sphere.  Admiral He had chosen the destroyer as a flagship, something that puzzled him.  Quite apart from the issue of the flag officer’s ego, there were the practicalities to consider.  Nanchang wasn’t a command ship and couldn’t be expected to direct operations if the flotilla suddenly had to fight for its life.  Why didn’t he come here?

The problem nagged at his mind, even though he knew he should be making preparations for their long-term survival.  Perhaps the Chinese officer didn’t want to stay on an American ship.  Perhaps his minder didn’t want him to be exposed to American influences.  Perhaps ... he didn’t know.  Perhaps Admiral He had assumed he’d never be in command of the fleet – there’d been no reason to think Admiral Dismukes would be trapped, unable to communicate – or he just hadn’t wanted to be underfoot.  That would be rare, amongst flag officers.  Hector had yet to meet one who didn’t like to stand on the bridge and pretend he was still a starship commander.  Maybe it was different in China.  Maybe.

He shook his head and stood.  It didn’t matter.  Right now, they had to survive long enough to figure out a way into the sphere, or reactivate the tramlines, or something – anything – that would give them a chance.  If not ... they were doomed.  There was no way to avoid it.

We can do it, he told himself.  All we need is a plan.

But nothing, nothing at all, came to mind.

***

“Fascinating,” Admiral He said, more to himself than anyone else.  “Quite remarkable.”

The hatch looked like an airlock on an industrial junk recycling station.  He would have thought it nothing more than that, if there hadn’t been a light code showing precisely how big the airlock was.  It was staggering to think the single plates were larger than a hundred battleships and the airlock itself could have comfortably taken the entire Chinese Navy without breaking a sweat.  He would never have taken the risk, and his minder would probably relieve him if he’d considered it, but it was fun to contemplate.

He looked at the sensor tech.  “There’s no sign of any command centre?  No way to open the hatch?”

“No, Admiral.”  The tech looked nervous, her eyes flickering between her admiral, his political minder, her captain and his minder.  “The hatch appears to have no visible means of control.”

Admiral He nodded, curtly.  It was ... alien.  Humans had long since ironed out a set of safety protocols – airlocks could be opened from the outside, even if the inner airlock remained firmly closed until the crew investigated – and interoperability procedures, but the Builders appeared quite happy to ignore the risks.  It was possible they placed the safety of the sphere ahead of everything else, including their own lives, yet ... they should have had an airlock centre near the hatch.  Or maybe he was overthinking it.  The hatch might resemble an airlock, but it was built on so great a scale there was simply no comparison.

“Keep scanning the surface,” he ordered.  He doubted they’d locate anything, under the layers of dust, but it provided an excuse to keep the destroyer isolated from the remainder of the flotilla.  Besides, there might be something.  He was sure no one would build a sphere without more than two ways in and out.  “And alert me if you find anything.”

“Aye, Admiral.”

Admiral He nodded and turned away.  It had seemed unbelievable, at first, when he’d been told the tramlines had vanished.  The possibility had been considered – if one could generate a tramline, one could certainly turn it off – and he had to admit it was possible, but ... what had happened?  Admiral Dismukes’ last update had stated the explorers had begun to probe the lone world ... had they disturbed something, or irritated a watching intelligence, or ... who knew?  Whatever it was, the fleet was trapped.  There was no way back home.

Unless we gain control of the tramline technology, he thought.  He was a brave man – he knew it to be true – and yet he couldn’t avoid feeling a twinge of uncertainty as he contemplated the steps he had to take.  It was bad enough knowing his government would declare him rogue, if he put the plan into play and then the tramlines reappeared, but ... that, at least, was an understandable threat.  The Builders, on the other hand ...  We could wind up picking a fight with a race so far ahead of us they might not even notice the threat.

He did his best to stay calm.  There was very little leeway.  They had to move quickly – and yet, when they did, they would be committed.  He’d drawn up checkpoints throughout the plan, moments when he could abort the operation without crossing the line, but ... at some point, his goals would become obvious.  And then the remainder of the fleet would turn on them.

Except, they’re in for a surprise, he thought, curtly.

“We’ll make the preparations now,” he said.  The die was about to be cast.  “Send the go signal.”

“Aye, sir.”

Admiral He nodded.  They’d need a few days to get everything into place.  If the tramlines reappeared, they could back down ... if they were lucky, they could do it so quickly no one would notice.  He hoped.  The worst possible outcome, he feared, would be being caught in the act, without being in place to carry through with the operation before it was too late.  How different would the Second World War have been, he asked himself, if the Japanese carriers had been spotted well before they reached Pearl Harbour?  What excuse could they possibly have offered, for being somewhere they had no business being ... unless it was to attack?  The Americans wouldn’t have accepted a simple navigational error, would they?

And would they have thrown Yamamoto to the winds, he asked himself, or started the war anyway?

He took his chair and forced himself to wait.  There was one great advantage of flying his flag on a destroyer.  She was Chinese.  The bugs and pickups hidden in the bulkheads were Chinese too.  There were no foreign crewmen pretending to be helpful and, in reality, spying on their guests.  It gave him much more leeway than he’d have had if he flew his flag on Curtis.  Besides, the gunboat carrier was a bigger target.  The Builders, if they turned hostile, would fire on her first.  Probably.

“Contact the rest of the flotilla,” he ordered.  “We’ll start by pooling our resources, then organising the space habitat into something that can keep us alive until the tramlines are restored.”

He felt a pang of guilt, despite everything.  It was his duty to put his life and career on the line for his country – he would either be a great hero, or a miserable failure – and yet he knew he was going to betray his allies.  They trusted him.  They thought they could rely on him.  And they were wrong.  He was going to set them up for the kill ...

There’s no choice, he told himself, savagely.  He understood the committee’s reasoning.  They needed an edge, whatever the price.  There’s no choice at all.

Chapter Twenty-Seven: North Mountain Base Camp, Dyson System (Interior)

“So,” Tobias said.  “How much trouble did you get into?”

Colin snorted, rudely, as the shuttle neared the base camp.  There had been a very sharp discussion with the captain about the dangers of letting scientists poke and prod anything that looked interesting without proper care and attention, although no one had expected to simply walk into a chamber designed to control tramlines.  Colin wasn’t sure if the Builders had been monumentally careless – Dyson One had shattered, after all – or if they’d thought anyone who entered the chamber would know how to use it.  For all they knew, the Builders had a sense the human race lacked and could read the controls effortlessly.  It was quite possible.  There were plenty of horror stories about people being hurt because they couldn’t read the warning signs.

The Builders might have covered the entire chamber in signs marked DANGER – DO NOT TOUCH, he reflected.  But if we can’t read the warnings, we can’t be expected to heed them.

He scowled, inwardly.  He wasn’t too surprised he’d been reassigned to the base camp, riding herd on Professor Mansion and his team ... again.  He was a little surprised Mansion hadn’t been sent to the brig, if only to keep him safe from people who might have lost everything when the tramline vanished, but ... it wasn’t an order he could question.  Not really.  He hoped there wouldn’t be any incidents, no researchers trying to hurt the man because they might never see their families again.  Colin wouldn’t shed a tear if he never saw his old man again – the babble zone had brought back bitter memories and warped others, leaving him unsure of what had really happened – but he missed his mother and sister.  He was one of the lucky ones.  Others might have lost a great deal more.

“Enough,” he said, finally.  It wasn’t something he wanted to dwell on.  His superiors would have every right to be pissed if he had a negligent discharge, even if no one got hurt, or disobeyed orders without a very good reason, but this ... he shook his head.  “They’re hopeful we can figure out how to turn the tramline back on.”

“Hopeful,” Tobias said.  “Do you know how much power it takes to create even a very brief tramline?”

Colin shrugged.  Gravimetric physics were beyond him.  He was content to use the tramlines to get from star to star, but how they worked ... he sighed.  What you didn’t know could kill you, or at least leave you stranded hundreds of light years from home.  He’d watched a movie once about the tramlines suddenly vanishing, a movie that had stripped most of the plot from the original books and replaced it with a lead character who’d looked more impressive before she’d taken off her top.  Which she’d done very quickly, when she wasn’t being a total bitch to everyone in her way.  Colin didn’t know how he’d done it, but the director had somehow made him feel for the bureaucrat who’d taken unsubtle pleasure in blowing her off and foiling her plans.  It was an awe-inspiring feat that suggested the man’s talents were completely wasted ...

He tried to recall what little of the plot had survived, but there was nothing of value beyond a sense it would all work out if one kept calm and carried on.  The isolated colonies had coped just fine, somehow ... the details, unsurprisingly, had been lost in the half-assed romantic plot of which wimp the main character would wind up marrying.  Colin was fairly sure the winner of that match would be the one who didn’t get the girl ...

The shuttle rocked, slightly.  “We’re coming up on the mountain,” Tobias said.  “The new sensors are clear.”

Colin frowned.  “Are you sure they cannot be detected?”

Tobias shot him a mischievous look.  “Our general feeling is that the alien sensors cannot tell the difference between our pseudogravity sensors and theirs,” he said.  “There’s no way to fine-tune the sensors to give their pulses a unique signature.  I think as long as we don’t do anything that might worry them – a kamikaze run at the shell, for example – we should be fine.”

“Really.”  Colin wasn’t convinced.  “Are you sure?”

“We’re still alive,” Tobias pointed out.  “If they wanted us dead, we’d be dead.”

“Charming,” Colin muttered.  Tobias was in surprisingly good spirits, for someone as cut off from his former life as the rest of them.  But then, he had very little waiting for him back home.  Colin thought Tobias had had a younger sister, like him, but he couldn’t be sure and didn’t want to ask.  “I hope you’re right.”

The North Mountain loomed up in front of them.  Colin closed his eyes and waited, rather than feel his head spinning as the perspective shifted around him.  There was no point in doing anything else.  If the fists – or weapons platforms – decided to have a go at them, there was nothing he could about it.  He’d just have to hope Tobias could evade the fist before it smashed them into a pulp.  The shuttle rocked again, then landed neatly on the ledge.  Colin opened his eyes, feeling his head rebel at the sight before him.  He felt as if he were an ant trapped inside a ball.

That’s too generous, he reminded himself.  We’re a lot smaller on this scale than any ant.

“Good luck,” Tobias said.  “I’ll see you later.”

“If there is a later,” Colin said.

He stood and made his way into the rear compartment.  His team – a pair of diplomats, a handful of researchers and a couple of additional marines – stood and followed him to the exit hatch.  They’d complained about wearing protective suits, pointing out that – now – there was a base camp on top of the mountain and another at the bottom.  Colin had pointed out, more patiently than he’d felt, that it was better to be safe rather than sorry.  If something happened at the worst possible time, and the capsule was exposed to the elements, the suits might make the difference between life or death.  His old instructor had taught his trainees how to survive in a depressurising ship, but ...

We are proceeding on the assumption there is life support gear and emergency supplies within reach, the old bastard had said.  If there isn’t, you’ll barely have the time to bend over and kiss your ass goodbye.

Lady Charlotte let out a giggle as they passed a plane of transparent metal, allowing them to see the clamps attaching the base camp to the mountain.  Colin understood.  Normally, they would have driven metal deep into the mountainside to anchor the base camp’s capsules, but it wasn’t possible on the sphere.  He’d heard the first settlement teams had busted a pair of mining lasers and a drill, trying to do the impossible.  They were lucky, he supposed, that there was no weather so far from the surface.  The structure was safe as long as the fists didn’t try to knock it off the mountain and send it crashing to the surface below.

“Welcome to Ben Nevis Base,” a naval officer said.  Colin couldn’t remember her name.  “We’ll have you on your way in a moment.”

“Thank you,” Lady Charlotte said.  “How big is this base?”

Colin smiled inwardly.  Lady Charlotte was looking around with interest, although it was hard to tell if it was real or feigned.  Her ladyship had probably spent quite some time kissing babies, making nice with people and generally pretending to be interested, like the upper-class women who’d slummed by visiting Colin’s school.  The Beast had kissed their rears and told them absolutely nothing.  They couldn’t handle the truth.  Lady Charlotte was a tougher customer.

“Right now, four habitation modules and the upper end of a funicular structure,” the officer said.  “We’re reluctant to risk expanding any further.  There’s nowhere to hide if they notice us.”

She glanced at Colin.  “The carriage is ready for you,” she said.  “If you’ll come with me ...”

Colin nodded.  Compared to the last trip to the surface, they would be riding in style.  He followed the officer, trying not to let his eyes drift to her rear.  It had been too long since he’d slept with anyone and ... he shook his head, reminding himself she was technically his superior as long as he was on the station.  God alone knew what would happen if they really did wind up stuck in the sphere forever, with only a relative handful of people.  The locals weren’t exactly friendly.

We tried to help them, he recalled.  He didn’t envy Lady Charlotte, who had orders to try to make contact with the locals.  And they repaid us by trying to kill us.

He sighed, inwardly, as they boarded the funicular.  The sociologists had speculated the sphere-dwellers had been intimidated by their visitors, too intimidated.  They’d tried to get rid of them as soon as the risks of keeping them around outweighed the benefits.  Colin figured they were probably right – there was no way the locals could comprehend the sheer power of a single starship, let alone the society that had produced it – but it still galled him that the locals had effectively gotten away with it.  There’d been minor terrorist attacks in the Security Zone that had provoked a far harsher response.

But we don’t know how the Builders will react if we carry out punitive strikes, he told himself.  We just need to try to avoid contact with our last set of hosts as much as possible and hope for the best.

***

Charlotte couldn’t help feeling nervous as the funicular rattled, then started the descent to the surface.  She’d seen the famed funicular at Bournemouth, but this ... she couldn’t help feeling, as the car picked up speed, that they were heading towards a sudden and violent end.  The boffins swore blind that the funicular was practically undetectable, unless one swept a terrain-mapping radar over the mountain; Charlotte had asked, rather sarcastically, if there was any reason the Builders couldn’t.  The boffins had had no answer, save for the simple fact the upper and lower base camps had been left unmolested.  She sighed inwardly, closing her eyes as they fell onwards.  It was perfectly safe, or so she’d been told, but it was disorienting.  Just how fast were they going?

It felt too soon, and yet too late, as the carriage jerked and slowed to a halt.  Charlotte opened her eyes and looked around.  The base camp on the surface had expanded rapidly, with a handful of prefabricated buildings spread out around the lower cable.  It didn’t look very well hidden to her – the Builders would have no trouble spotting the camp if they bothered to look – but perhaps there were structures hidden in the jungle or otherwise concealed from orbital observation.  The hatch opened, allowing her team to disembark on wobbly legs.  Some wag had stuck a wartime poster on a wall, just inside the station.  CARELESS TALK COSTS LIVES.

Charlotte’s lips twitched in amusement.  The safety briefing had been extensive, and somewhat repetitive, but she’d been on the surface before.  She knew what would happen if someone made a radio call, even a very brief transmission.  She hadn’t argued when the naval crew had searched their bags, just to make sure they weren’t carrying anything that could emit a signal.  There was always someone who thought the rules didn’t apply to him and that there was no real danger.  Idiots.  Making a radio call on the surface would be nothing more than suicide.

“Lady Charlotte,” Sir Horace said.  He was a diplomatic staffer, two levels below an actual diplomat.  He’d been sent to the surface as a stopgap.  The planners had thought the locals couldn’t or wouldn’t reach the bottom of the mountain, let alone climb outside the atmosphere, but they’d wanted to make sure someone was on hand if they did.  “If you’ll come with me, my office is right this way.”

Charlotte nodded and followed him into a tiny chamber within the prefab.  She knew ambassadors and civil servants who’d have pitched a fit at such a small and cramped office – the table and chairs were plastic and portable and not fancy in the least – but Sir Horace didn’t seem to mind.  He waved her to a chair, then poured them both some tea.  There were no servants either.  Charlotte approved.  They didn’t have the manpower to keep up the niceties.

“We have been somewhat limited in our approach to the local settlements,” Sir Horace said.  “On Vesy, we were able to use disguised probes and microscopic bugs to monitor alien activities without any risk of detection.  Here, we have been reluctant to risk anything of the sort.  We know for a fact the weapons platforms have no qualms about firing on population centres.”

“I was there,” Charlotte reminded him.  In hindsight, manipulating a weapons platform to take out an enemy city might have been a mistake.  “Do they know we’re here?”

“It’s hard to say,” Sir Horace said.  “The closest settlement – the closest we know about, at least – is thirty miles away.  Their hunters do seem to roam the land around the settlement, as noted in the original team’s logs, but we’re not sure if they come close to the mountain.  They don’t come close to the command centre.  The structure is completely off-limits to them.”

Charlotte nodded.  “Have they had any contact with ... with the cities we originally contacted?”

“It’s hard to say,” Sir Horace said, again.  “We have watched their doings through passive long-range sensors.  They do have working catapults, as well as improved bows and arrows, but it is unclear how much they know about what really happened.  Catapults aren’t particularly difficult to duplicate, once you get the idea.  They may just think they’re an innovation from more distant cities ...”

“We’ll see,” Charlotte said.  “Language?”

“The same as the other cities, as far as we can tell,” Sir Horace confirmed.  “We do think there are probably local dialects and words that are meaningless outside their region, like the difference between American and British English, but the language is broadly identical.”

“That’s a relief,” Charlotte said.  “Do they pose any threat to us?”

“Not unless they really do have magic powers,” Sir Horace said.  “Their bows and arrows are good, but they won’t crack our armour.  The poison darts have the same problem.  We also have protective shots, in case they do get a dart into our skin.  There shouldn’t be any real danger unless the weapons platforms take a hand.”

Charlotte kept her thoughts to herself.  She’d studied the local civilisation.  It was ... oddly fluid.  Each city rose to power, dominated its peers and then fell back to be dominated by others.  There was no real sense of permanence, no apparent inclination to build a permanent empire ... in a sense, the region was both fluid and stable.  The leading city might change constantly, but the overall situation did not.  The technology to change that, to make empire-building practical, simply didn’t exist.  It was hard to run an empire when you couldn’t support an army big enough to keep your subjects in line.

But quite a few primitive human societies managed it, she thought.  The Persians and Romans had been small, compared to the USSR or the British Empire, but their tech base had been far lower.  Why not here?

She frowned, recalling her last visit.  One city could dominate another, true, but it was hard for it to dominate more than two or three of their neighbours.  The neighbours would gang up on the dominant city and crush it, then fall out and start fighting amongst themselves.  One’s empire couldn’t snowball into existence if one couldn’t even get the ball rolling.  But who knew?  If they sold the nearest city some modern weapons, they’d punch out all their neighbours and start putting together an empire that would awe Alexander the Great.

But that’s very much a last resort, she told herself.  Right now, we still have hope of leaving the sphere.

“The walker is ready to depart, once the research team are on their way,” Sir Horace said.  “Unless you want to rest ...”

“No, thank you,” Charlotte said.  There’d be a chance to rest on the walker, unless the locals were a lot closer than they thought.  “Just show me to the washroom, then we can get started.”

She attended to the call of nature, then walked outside.  The sphere was as weird as she remembered, although there was an odd niggling feeling she was growing used to the alien environment.  She’d read reports stating that several personnel hadn’t been able to cope at all and had been hastily shipped back to the flotilla ... she had no idea if they’d been sent outside the sphere before the tramlines vanished, but she hoped for their sake they had.  It wouldn’t be fun to spend the rest of one’s life in an environment one couldn’t tolerate.

Perhaps they’d get used to it, in time, she thought, coldly.  There may be no other choice.

Her eyes swept over the camp.  It looked defenceless, although she’d been assured there were defences positioned to cover the buildings if the locals attacked.  The nasty, vindictive part of her mind wanted them to launch an attack, just so they could be slaughtered.  Letting them get away with trying to kill the first landing party went against the grain.  Britain had learnt the hard way what happened if you let terrorists, rogue states and tin-pot dictators get away with poking and prodding at you.  It was better to be blamed for disproportionate retribution than let them keep going until they really crossed the line.

Sir Horace joined her.  “The walker is ready now, My Lady,” he said.  “Are you?”

“Yeah,” Charlotte said.  “Let’s go.”

Chapter Twenty-Eight: Alien Structure, Dyson System (Interior)

“It is quite remarkable,” Mansion said, as they walked through the alien structure.  “It seems to grow bigger with every passing day.”

Colin scowled.  The mapping efforts had worked, for a given value of worked.  Colin had heard all the jokes about junior officers who managed to take one look at a map and lead their troops in entirely the wrong direction – or worse, like the joke about the Irish deserter who ran the wrong way and got the Victoria Cross – but the maps of the alien structure were so confusing he couldn’t blame anyone for getting lost.  The whole structure appeared to be bigger on the inside, yet ... the boffins weren’t sure.  Personally, Colin suspected they’d watched a little too much Doctor Who.  If the Builders could cram an entire world inside a pocket dimension and link it to a phone box, why bother constructing the spheres?  It was absurd.

“I’ll take your word for it,” he said.  They stepped into another chamber.  “Remember, don’t touch anything.”

The professor shot him a sharp look, but said nothing.  Colin gritted his teeth.  There was just no way to predict what would happen if they touched the wrong thing.  Some alien devices seemed to do nothing, as far as they could tell; others altered the lighting, the gravity, or did something ... Colin had interviewed a badly shaken officer who insisted something had happened, although he couldn’t say what.  If the man’s vitals hadn’t been all over the place, Colin would have wondered if he was bullshitting.  But the man had clearly had a fright.

“I do think the intelligence tests need to be solved one by one,” Mansion said.  “There’s a limit to how far cheating can get us.”

Colin scowled.  “What do you mean?”

“Imagine you’re playing a computer game,” Mansion told him.  “You start at the first level and work your way up, gaining experience all the time.  The difficulty does increase as you go on, but so does your skill.  But if you cheat, and use a level select to go to the very highest level, you’re not ready.  You find the level impossible and simply can’t get through.”

“Like pitting a raw recruit against an experienced SAS trooper,” Colin mused.  He supposed Mansion had a point.  If his instructors had dumped him into the final section of commando training, without making him go through all the earlier sections first, he’d have washed out or died.  “And you think we’re making a mistake?”

“It’s hard to say,” Mansion said.  “Some of their intelligence tests are straightforward.  Others ... we needed to use computers to solve them.  I think they were hoping the locals would either develop tech on their own or evolve to the point they could solve problems in their heads.  Most humans couldn’t, but ... at some point, our brains stopped evolving and tech filled the gap.”

“Maybe,” Colin said.  There had been a long-standing debate over who was tougher.  Modern soldiers, or primitive legionnaires.  Roman troops had marched for hours, carrying their kit on their backs, and gone into battle with swords and shields rather than rifles and plasma cannons.  “What do you think we should do?”

Mansion keyed his terminal, bringing up the map.  “I think we should start here,” he said, pointing to a chamber on the far edge of the structure.  “And then move through the next set of chambers, solving puzzles as we go.”

Colin gave him a thoughtful look.  “Why ...?”

“People used to think the Earth was flat,” Mansion said.  “It took quite some time for someone to deduce the Earth was actually a sphere.  Even when they did, the knowledge wasn’t of immediate practical value.  The Ancient Greeks figured it out first, if I recall correctly, but they never sailed around the world.  They didn’t even reach China, let alone America.  Thing is, the locals probably think their world is flat too, but if you imagine the mountain as being at the bottom of a ball – which it technically is – you can envisage all the settlements spread out around it in a three-dimensional pattern.  And if we follow that logic, we can corkscrew our way into the heart of the structure.”

“Yes, but not alone,” Colin said.  He led the way back to the entrance – and the small camp outside.  “We’ll go as a team.”

He regretted it almost at once, as they started to probe further into the structure.  The marines seemed baffled by the interior, their eyes flickering from side to side as if they expected to be attacked at any moment, while the researchers kept arguing over the slightest things.  Colin couldn’t escape the sense they were being toyed with, as they walked from chamber to chamber.  Every intelligence test – each one harder than the last – took them further and further off the map.  Colin was starting to think Mansion was right.  There was no sense the structure was changing around them, but every time they blinked – after passing a test – something did.  It was a nightmare.  He almost wished he was back in the war, even though humanity had been pushed to the brink of defeat.  He’d known what he was doing back then ...

“Curious,” Mansion remarked, as they slipped into another chamber.  “We have proof, if we needed it, that the structure really is bigger on the inside.”

“Unless it is really shuffling the interior around us,” another scientist pointed out.  “For all we know, we could be trapped in a holographic environment.  We might not be walking at all.”

Colin did his best to tune the ensuing debate out as the scientists messed with their devices, all the while arguing about matters so far beyond him he didn’t have the slightest comprehension of what they were talking about.  It seemed unlikely anyone could reshuffle the entire interior on a whim, or use holograms to conceal certain pathways and reveal others, but ... who knew?  The Builders had managed to produce solid-light structures, something the human race had thought impossible.  With that, and enough computing power, they could create entire worlds.

And fool us into believing they’re real, he thought.  The tabloids had once run a set of stories about a woman who claimed the world was really a magical place, but some dark sorcerer – or something – had cast a spell to drain the magic and turn it into a mundane hellhole.  The woman had been delusional, yet ... if she’d been trapped in a holographic world, with no way to turn off the power, would she ever realise she’d been trapped?  Might she think the real world was the fake?  What is the point of this place?

He frowned.  Perhaps they had it the wrong way round.  The Builders didn’t care about the locals.  But if the locals solved the intelligence tests ... would they mark themselves as a potential threat?  They thought the alien structure controlled the hatch, but ... what if it was designed to watch for threats and obliterate them?  Or ...

We don’t have a choice, he thought, sourly.  The flotilla was trapped.  They could maintain the ships for quite some time, but not forever.  If we don’t find a way out, we’re doomed.

***

Charlotte felt her heart race as the walker slowly came to a halt at the edge of the cultivated field.  The First Contact protocols she’d had drilled into her, for the moment she encountered the Builders, suddenly seemed pointless.  The human race had never really devised procedures for contacting primitive races.  Hell, if the Russian deserters had left the Vesy alone, their homeworld would never have become a human protectorate.  But the people ahead of her were human.  They fell into a grey area. 

Were their ancestors brought here to keep them safe, she mused as she checked her suit and scrambled out of the vehicle, or as pets?

The thought haunted her as the natives slowly approached.  There’d been no attempt to conceal the walker’s passage – the security team had noted it would’ve been impossible – but it was hard to tell if they’d been seen until they reached the field.  Charlotte braced herself, her eyes sweeping over the natives.  They were all women – there were no men within eyeshot, which matched their earlier experience  – and all quite old, by local standards.  It was a hard life.  The oldest woman might be no older than Charlotte herself, but she looked old enough to be Charlotte’s grandmother.  It was a grim reminder that, for all she might resent the bonds of modern society, it was still far superior to the past.

Particularly if you were a woman, she reminded herself.  Or a poor man.  Or anyone, really.

She held up her hands, trying to show no threat.  She had to look thoroughly alien to them – she wasn’t sure if they could see through the transparent material covering her face – and if they’d heard anything from the other cities, they might have a good idea what she was.  If they believed what they heard ... Charlotte knew stories grew in the telling, and that the locals didn’t seem to think about the past in any way that made sense, but she had no idea what they might have made of any rumours they’d heard. 

And what would they make of her?

A woman raised a pipe to her mouth and blew, the motion so quick Charlotte didn’t even have time to flinch.  A tiny dart, barely larger than a baby’s finger, thudded into the cheek of Charlotte’s face mask and fell to the ground.  Charlotte allowed herself a moment of relief – she knew the darts could be blown with astonishing force – then smiled.  The woman stared in shock.  Charlotte tried to hide her amusement.  The concept of transparent clothes had no place in that woman’s world.

“I greet you,” she said, carefully.  The linguistics experts insisted the locals spoke the same tongue, sure, but she wasn’t convinced.  It was quite possible that something was perfectly fine in one city and an ethnic slur in the next.  “I come in peace.”

There was a long pause.  “I greet you,” the oldest woman said.  Her voice was surprisingly strong.  “From where do you come?”

“From a very long way away,” Charlotte said.  There had been a long debate over precisely what to tell the natives, if they managed to make contact.  Explaining the concept of stars to people who’d never seen one struck her as a waste of time.  She doubted they understood anything about their world, certainly not the clockwork movements of the sphere.  “I come to trade.”

She didn’t relax as the women asked question after question, ranging from puzzling to surprisingly insightful.  They weren’t stupid, she reminded herself, and there was a good chance they’d heard something from the other cities.  The entire concept of trade goods was largely unknown – the cities were self-sufficient, to the point they didn’t need to use resources from elsewhere – but she had a feeling it would catch on quickly.  The handful of very primitive tools and devices she offered, the work of a few moments on a modern fabber, impressed them more than her words.

And we’ll have to be careful, she thought, grimly.  On Earth, entire nations had been economically devastated by unrestricted imports from more advanced countries.  They’d been stripped of their resources and left with almost nothing in return.  If we accidentally make them dependent on us, we’ll fuck up their society beyond repair.

She wasn’t surprised, shortly afterwards, to be invited into the city itself.  It was just like the earlier one she’d seen, a cluster of stone and wooden buildings that reminded her of the early South American civilisations.  Their recordings had set off a firestorm on Earth, with some people claiming the likeness was close enough to suggest more contact between Earth and Dyson Two than anyone wanted to think ... Charlotte had read their theories and laughed.  The resemblances weren’t just superficial.  Both cultures had faced the same problem and come up with similar solutions.  There was no need to assume ancient aliens had whispered something in their ear when there was a much more reasonable explanation at hand.

“We do not know you,” the older woman said.  The rest of the welcoming party had dispersed, although Charlotte was sure they weren’t that far away.  “But we can talk.”

Charlotte allowed herself a moment of relief, then got down to business.

***

“I was right,” Mansion said, as he unlocked another chamber.  “This puzzle could not be solved without the working from the four earlier puzzles.”

Colin nodded, although he didn’t really know what the scientist meant.  He felt as if he’d been awake for days, his head aching in a manner that made him feel too tired to sleep.  The boffins might have been excited by the tests and had no hesitation in congratulating themselves for beating them, but their military escorts weren’t so thrilled.  Colin had a nasty feeling they wouldn’t be able to turn back, not now.  They were committed to finishing the tests.

Wonderful, he thought, sourly.  He’d always loathed his maths teachers for insisting he show his work.  It had made it much harder to cheat ... he felt a sudden flash of hatred for his past self, the bullying stupid asshole that he’d been.  How much potential had he wasted, by not developing his mind?  How many tests did I fail because I tried to cheat?

“It’s very clever,” Mansion assured him.  “They don’t want the answers from the previous test, just the working.  We can use that to build up the answer they want ...”

Which isn’t something you can get from a computer, Colin thought.  Or a calculator.

He sighed inwardly.  His first maths teacher had told him to do his work by hand.  He’d said it was pointless.  A calculator could do everything he could and more.  But what happened when there was no calculator?  Colin hadn’t believed the story of the rogue accountant who’d stolen money from his employer because the poor bastard hadn’t known how to check his accounts, but he had to admit it was possible.  It had been the way of the world, in his hometown.  You took everything you could, when you had a chance, because no one would hesitate to do the same to you.

But there was a better way, he thought, bitterly.  The Royal Marines had knocked the stuffing out of him, in the process of beating him into shape.  And if I’d known it ...

The chamber lit up suddenly.  Colin tensed as he saw a new set of lines and light codes – they had to be light codes – appear above them.  Mansion stepped back hastily, sucking in his breath.  The others did the same, unwilling to risk touching the lights.  They’d all been briefed on just what had happened, on the lone world.  If the tramlines could be turned off, what else could go wrong?

“I think I see the logic,” Mansion said, slowly.  “The system is a holographic interface” – Colin had to keep from snorting; they already knew that – “that directly links to the items it controls.  We did look at similar systems on Earth, but we couldn’t smooth out the system and remove all the problems.  The Builders seem to have solved the functionality issues and made it work.”

Colin nodded.  “And you touching the tramline icon turned off the tramline?”

“Perhaps,” Mansion said.  “It makes no difference, from the point of view of a datanode processor, if the person touching it knows what they’re doing or not.  It just does as it is told.”

“Hah,” Colin muttered.  He’d learnt the importance of passwords from the day he’d demanded his first smartphone.  It struck him as insane to leave a system that controlled a fucking tramline unsecured, although – to a race capable of generating them – perhaps turning it back on again was as easy as deleting a mistake on the computer.  “Can you see any logic here?”

“I think so.”  Mansion tapped his datapad.  “Look at the lights.  That set represents the fists, hovering near the mountain; that pair might well be the nearest weapons platforms.  And that light there, right at the bottom, might be the hatch.  Look closely.”

Colin frowned.  The light was dim at first, but as he stared it took on shape and form.  He could see the mountain, and the funnel, and – at the bottom – the hatch.  It had to be the hatch.  His hand itched to reach out to touch it, to try to find their way back to open space, but he didn’t dare.  They needed to run the question past their superiors before they touched anything.

And they won’t know any better than us, he thought.  They won’t know what call to make.

“Study the system,” he ordered.  “Try and work out how to use it.  But don’t touch anything.”

Professor Edstrom caught his eye.  “This is a ... user interface,” he said.  “It isn’t the device itself.”

Colin glanced at him.  “What do you mean?”

“Most humans can’t handle direct coding on the datanet,” Professor Edstrom said.  “They don’t – normally, when someone sets up a datanet site, they do it through a datanet program that does most of the hard work for them.  You may copy something from one site and paste it into your own, but ... you’re not doing the work.  The program is.”

“And your point?”  Colin didn’t want to be distracted from Mansion.  The American had shown a disturbing tendency to touch without thinking.  “What do you mean?”

“This station may send orders to other places on the network, but it might not be the place those orders are carried out,” Professor Edstrom told him.  “We may find much less here than we thought.”

“But we should be able to open the hatch,” Mansion said.  He sounded confident.  That was probably a bad sign.  “If it works ...”

“Yeah,” Colin agreed.  “If.”

Chapter Twenty-Nine: HMS Endeavour, Dyson System (Interior)

Admiral Dismukes spoke with cold urgency.  “Do we take the chance?”

Staci said nothing for a long moment.  It had been nearly two weeks since the tramline had vanished, two weeks since they’d lost all contact with Admiral He and the rest of the MNF.  It had been rough, even though she’d made sure to keep the crew as busy as possible.  Too many were facing the permanent loss of their loved ones or fearing a life on the sphere ... a handful even thought they’d been trapped deliberately, with the intention of turning the crew into alien pets.  There’d been drunkenness and fights and even a petition to turn the starship’s weaponry on the shell, as if it would so much as scratch the alien metal.  If hope vanished completely ...

“I wish we knew it would work,” she muttered.  The researchers were finally starting to unlock the secrets of the alien control systems, although they’d been quick to point out they still didn’t understand how the wretched things worked.  “We don’t know for sure they can open the hatch.”

She stared at the live feed from the base camp.  The alien tech – the hatch mechanism - had been in vacuum for millions of years.  It was quite possible something had gone wrong in that time, that the technology was broken or so badly fouled by dust it could not be opened.  Or ... she wondered, numbly, what else would go wrong?  She would be a great deal happier if they could connect human datanodes to the alien technology and access the control processors directly, but so far that had been impossible.  She had a nasty feeling they might as well try to connect primitive computers to their modern descendants.  It simply wouldn’t work.

“We have to try,” she said, finally.  “Admiral?”

Admiral Dismukes stared at his hands.  Staci could guess at his thoughts.  He wasn’t ready to give up and establish a settlement on the sphere, or risk continue poking the lone world and other alien installations until they made a more fatal mistake, or ... or just remain in orbit, their ships breaking down piece by piece until it was all over.  Yes, there was a risk in trying to open the hatch.  But what other choice did they have?

There’s no time to wait, she thought.  The secret won’t stay a secret forever.

She sighed, inwardly.  The Royal Navy hadn’t suffered an outright mutiny for centuries, unless one counted the mess on Vanguard, but that might change.  The crew were getting desperate.  If they thought they had a way out – and the command staff was refusing to use it – what would happen then?  It galled her to even consider the possibility – she’d certainly never planned a mutiny during her career as a lower-ranked officer – but it had to be faced.  It wasn’t just Royal Navy personnel trapped in the sphere.  It was Americans and French and Russians and Chinese, not all of whom were military.  All hell could break loose at any moment. 

“We’ll do it,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “And we’ll hope for the best.”

Staci nodded.  “I’ll give the orders, Admiral,” she said.  “Do you want to move your flag?”

“No.”  The admiral sounded very certain.  “I owe it to myself to take the risk.”

So do we all, Staci thought.  So do we all.

The thought haunted her as she returned to the bridge, took command and started to make preparations.  Jumping through the tramline had been easy, a routine matter once they’d confirmed they weren’t going to materialise inside the shell or one of the sunshades.  The hatch ... it was confirmation, more confirmation, that the Builders thought on a scale no human could match.  It felt as if her starship was no bigger than a starfighter, flying through a carrier’s launch tube.  Her perspective was completely mangled.  Years of training and experience insisted she was about to ram her ship into a planet.

We just have to thread the needle, she thought.  Her tutors had tried to teach her how to sew, but she’d never been very good at it.  Luckily, we just have to fly through the eye and out into normal space.

“Captain,” Jenner said.  “All departments have checked in.  We are ready to proceed.”

Staci glanced at Helen Yang.  “Are the new sensors prepped and ready to go?”

“Yes, Captain,” Helen said.  “If they start powering up the fists, we’ll know about it.”

“Good.”  Staci eyed the display, her heart sinking.  Last time, she hadn’t known – she’d had no way to know – how many pseudogravity beams pervaded the system.  Now ... she had the uneasy feeling that the sphere was a clockwork model, held together by struts of pure gravitational force.  Some of the researchers even speculated that Dyson One had shattered because the pseudogravity beams had failed, allowing tidal forces to tear the structure apart.  “Helm, be ready to alter course and evade at a moment’s notice.  Tactical, be ready to deploy screamers.”

“Aye, Captain.”

Staci took a breath.  She would have preferred to risk a smaller ship, but Endeavour was the only starship with the modified sensors.  She’d offloaded as many of her personnel as possible, either to the rest of the ships or to the base camp on the sphere, yet ... she had no illusions about the likely outcome if the fists decided to attack.  Endeavour wasn’t anything like as manoeuvrable as the Unicorn.  If the screamers didn’t work, her ship was doomed.

“Communications, send the signal,” she ordered.  “Open the hatch.”

“Aye, Captain.”

The moments passed, each one feeling like an hour.  It would take time for the laser signal to reach the surface, time for the message to be shot through the landlines, time for the team on the far end to act, time for ... she had no idea, no one did, how quickly it would take for something – anything – to happen.  The tramline had vanished instantly, as far as anyone could tell.  It was ... weird, something for the researchers to consider later, but for the moment it was just another impossible thing in an impossible alien megastructure at the end of an impossibly long tramline.

And that raises the question, she reminded herself.  Did we shut off the outer tramline too?

“Captain,” Helen said.  “I’m picking up pseudogravity pulses, near the hatch!”

Staci sucked in her breath.  “Analysis?”

“Uncertain,” Helen said.  “It’s possible they’re hauling the hatch open.”

Inefficient, Staci thought, although she knew perfectly well she had no way to judge.  The hatch was larger than anything the human race had ever sculpted.  She could fly a space habitat through the hatch and never have to worry about hitting the sides, as long as she was careful.  Is it really opening?

Sweat poured down her back as she leaned forward.  There’d been no way to be sure the hatch could still be opened.  The survey teams had found no way to blow the hinges, or any other way to open the hatch by force.  The first mission to the sphere had also noted layers of dust on the hatch ... she wondered, suddenly, if that was going to pose a problem in more ways than one.  Space dust wasn’t normally a hazard to navigation, but there was so much of it that it might damage her hull.  Endeavour was armoured, yet ... she wished, suddenly, for a battleship’s armour.  Vanguard and her sisters could bull through conflicts that would tear Endeavour to shreds.

“Captain,” Helen said.  Her voice was shaky.  “The hatch is opening.”

Staci stared, unable to escape a sense of awe.  It looked so simple on the display, the hatch sliding apart to allow ships to pass in and out of the sphere.  It was hard to grasp the sheer size of the hatch, that pieces of metal bigger than her entire nation, even an entire planet, were slowly moving.  No, it wasn’t slow.  It was moving at impossible speeds, compared to anything human-made.  It just looked slow because it was so big. 

She took a breath.  “Tactical?”

“Nothing to report,” McDougall said.  “There’s no hint the fists are intending to block us.”

“They must think we have every right to leave the sphere,” Jenner said.

“Check with Ben Nevis,” Staci ordered.  The base’s sensors were keyed to the sphere’s surface, watching for any signs of trouble.  “Are we damaging the sphere?”

There was a chilling pause.  Her imagination had suggested the air leaking out of the sphere like water draining out of a bath.  She had been assured it was impossible, that the mountain would prevent the atmosphere pouring into interplanetary space, but she’d feared ... she wondered, numbly, if it would be better to request a transfer to small ships after they made it back to Earth.  Her career might not go much further, if at all, but at least she wouldn’t be toying with billions of lives.

“No, Captain,” Helen said, finally.  “The sphere walls are holding.”

Staci glanced at McDougall.  “Launch a tactical probe, laser comlinks only.”

“Aye, Captain,” McDougall said.  “Probe away.”

“We wait,” Staci said.  She wasn’t sure how long the hatch would remain open.  The boffins had been unable to decide if it would shut automatically or if it would remain open until ordered to close.  They’d wanted to experiment, arguing it might help them understand the far more complex workings of the lone world.  The admiral had overruled them.  Those experiments could wait until they knew if they could get in or out at will.  “Inform me if the probe picks up any dangers.”

“Aye, Captain,” McDougall said.  “Levels of space dust are surprisingly low.  I think the gravity waves pushed most of it into space or onto the shell.”

Staci nodded, impatiently.  “And the fleet?”

McDougall hesitated.  “I’m reading at least nine ships holding position near the hatch,” he said.  “And ... I can’t say for sure, Captain, but I can’t get a read on the outgoing tramline.”

Fuck.  Staci barely kept herself from saying it out loud.  She could feel the sudden wave of despair washing around the bridge.  They’d hoped they hadn’t somehow turned off the second tramline ... she wouldn’t have cared, not really, if Admiral He had led the rest of the fleet straight back to Earth, as long as they could.  We’re trapped.

She put the thought aside.  It wasn’t hopeless.  The probe was quite some distance from Dyson One and the tramline.  It might have missed it.  Or ... they had opened the hatch, which meant they could perhaps restore the tramline too.  Or ...

“Captain,” Yang said.  “The hatch is fully open.  The plates have come to a halt.”

Staci nodded.  The hatch could close again at any moment, trapping them inside or – worse – catching the ship and crushing it effortlessly.  She’d once attended an inquest into a shuttlebay accident when the doors had shut at the wrong moment, destroying a shuttlecraft and killing seven crewmen.  There’d been a communications breakdown, they’d concluded, and the doors had started closing early.  If the sphere’s hatch closed at the wrong time, the consequences would be a great deal worse.

“Helm.”  Staci’s mouth was suddenly dry.  “Helm, take us out of the sphere.”

Endeavour’s drives hummed as the starship glided forward.  Staci had the sense they were riding a rollercoaster that was about to plunge down the track at terrifying speed.  It wasn’t true – they weren’t really heading down; the term had little meaning in interstellar space – but it chilled her anyway.  The ship inched onwards ... she half-expected gravity beams to give them a push, to shove them into interstellar space, but there was nothing.  Perhaps the Builders weren’t too concerned about fragile starships crashing into their hatches, or the shell itself.  It was very close to indestructible.

And yet, Dyson One shattered, she reminded herself.  She had no idea what sort of stresses and strains, or weapons, could have done that, but they needed to know.  What destroyed a sphere that should have been damn-near indestructible?

The sense they were pressing their luck grew stronger as they neared the hatch and started to pass through.  Staci gritted her teeth, trying to tell herself they had plenty of time.  They could accelerate, if the hatch started to close ... and, on this scale, Endeavour was nothing more than a flea compared to a whale.  But a claustrophobic feeling pressed down on her anyway ... she didn’t relax, not at all, until the stars appeared in front of them.  They were free.

“Captain,” Atkinson said.  “We have passed through the sphere.”

Helen cleared her throat.  “Captain, the other tramline is gone.  I’m sorry.”

“At least we’re out of the sphere,” Staci said, firmly.  Being able to get in and out at will would make things easier ... and besides, it was progress.  She just had to keep telling herself it was progress.  “Communications, raise the fleet.”

“Aye, Captain,” MacPhee said. 

Staci frowned as the tactical display updated rapidly.  There’d been nine ships left outside the sphere, under Admiral He’s command, and seven were holding position near the hatch.  Her eyes narrowed, wondering just what the Chinese admiral was doing.  Did he have teams on the surface, trying to find other ways into the sphere?  Or ... or what?  She could understand an officer being reluctant to risk chasing scavengers through the debris field, if he was cut off from all resupply, but why hold position so close to the wall?  Something didn’t quite add up.

“Captain,” MacPhee said.  “We’re being hailed by Curtis.”

“Put her through,” Staci ordered.  “And bring Admiral Dismukes into the comlink.”

“Aye, Captain.”

Staci leaned forward as Captain Hector Howard appeared in front of her.  She’d met him during one of Lady Charlotte’s gatherings, although there’d been little time for any private chats.  It had been difficult to have any sort of discussion beyond bland pleasantries when she knew the bulkheads had ears.  But he’d fought in the war before assuming command of a ship that was a dead ringer for Lion. 

“Captain,” she said.  “It’s good to see you again.”

“And you,” Howard said, as Admiral Dismukes’ image joined them.  “Admiral.”

“Captain,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “Status report?”

“The tramline vanished.  Both tramlines.  Admiral He assumed command and ordered a withdrawal to the research station, then arranged for the fleet to survey the sphere in hopes of either opening the hatch or finding another way in,” Howard said.  “We drew a complete blank on both.  And then you came out of the sphere.”

“We found out how to open it,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “Where is Admiral He now?”

“He was negotiating with the scavengers, or at least some of them,” Howard said.  “They’re stuck here too, just like us, and the admiral was hoping to convince them to join us and pool their resources.  The results have been mixed.  A couple have come forward to make a deal, but others have remained resolutely silent.  I signalled him the moment we saw the hatch opening, so he should join us shortly.”

“Imaginative of him,” Admiral Dismukes commented.  “How well it’ll hold up when we get home I don’t know, but ... that’s out of our hands.”

Staci frowned, slowly.  The Chinese and Russians were death on independent spacers.  It was one of the reasons there were so many émigré Chinese and Russians in the Belt, fleeing governments that were not only oppressive, but given to issuing orders that made no sense to spacers.  She’d even heard horror stories about their colonies being ordered to turn off their life support to save power!  That one struck her as enemy propaganda, but ... it wouldn’t be the first time a groundhog had issued orders that made no sense in space.  And yet ...

Admiral He was taking one hell of a risk, if the tramlines were reconnected tomorrow.  His government would expect more from him than quietly condoning independent spacers.  The fact he might never see Earth again, that his command might wither and die so far from home, would never cross their minds.  He should have done the impossible and predicted the future.  That Admiral He had taken such a chance bothered her.  Even if he understood the logic, she would have expected him to find a way to blame it on a foreign underling.

But then, he’d be called out for letting an underling set policy, she thought.  Hell, he’d be in trouble even if the underling really did set the policy because he was out of touch with Admiral Dismukes.

“I’ll discuss it when he arrives,” Dismukes said.  If he shared Staci’s misgivings, he didn’t show it.  “Until then, we’ll arrange to extract the rest of the flotilla and then start probing the command centres more carefully.”

“Aye, Admiral,” Howard said.  “We could also find a way to wedge the hatch open.”

“Difficult,” Staci said.  “If we use a battleship, she’d be crushed effortlessly.”

Howard smiled.  “We could drag a piece of rubble from Dyson One over here.  It’s made out of the same material, isn’t it?”

“Good point,” the admiral said.  “Irresistible force, meet immovable object.”

Staci smiled.  It was a good idea.  But ...  “We don’t know how the Builders will react.”

“They let us turn off the tramlines,” Admiral Dismukes pointed out.  “They probably won’t object to us wedging the hatch open.”

“If we can,” Howard said.  He sounded like a man who’d just come face to face with the reality there was someone better.  A lot better.  “The sheer force of that much tonnage ...”

“Captain,” Helen said, quietly.  Staci looked up.  No one would interrupt a command discussion unless it was important.  Vitally important.  “I ... I just performed a pseudogravity sweep of nearspace.  It’s ... I ...”

“Spit it out,” Staci snapped.  She wasn’t sure she could handle any more shocks.  “What’s happened?”

“Captain ...”  Helen swallowed and started again.  “Captain, if I’m reading this right, there is a cloaked fleet approaching on attack vector!”

Chapter Thirty: The Hatch, Dyson System

If there was one advantage to having a government minder who knew next to nothing about the realities of spaceflight, Admiral He had long since decided, it was that he could spin a story secure in the knowledge his minder didn’t know enough to pick out the blatant lies.  Not that he took it completely for granted, of course.  The minder might be a lot smarter than he looked – the nasty part of He’s mind insisted it wouldn’t be difficult – and just pretending to be ignorant in order to lull his charge into a false sense of security.  It wasn’t easy to get away with murder on a Chinese warship – the monitors were everywhere, even in the washrooms – but if anyone could it was the admiral in command of the fleet.  And if the tramline leading out of the system wasn't restored, who’d be able to punish him for murder?

He kept his face under tight control as the fleet neared the sphere.  It had been sheer luck the hatch had opened, just as he committed himself.  He’d given serious thought to backing off, the moment he’d seen the hatch start to move, on the grounds he still had plausible deniability, but his minder wouldn’t have let him get away with it.  There were security agents hidden within the ranks, if he was any judge; hard men who’d abandon their tasks and storm the bridge if they thought their admiral had abandoned his mission and effectively conceded defeat.  If the tramline had been restored, he’d have no choice but to take the risk.  The mission had come alarmingly close to failure.

“Admiral,” the tactical officer said.  “We are nearing the ambush point.”

The point of no return, Admiral He thought, although in truth that decision had been taken a long time ago.  Admiral Dismukes and his officers had no idea his squadron existed.  He’d been able to issue orders that seemed logical, on the surface, but in reality led the rest of the fleet into a trap.  It was a shame he hadn’t been able to find a pretext to put security forces on the other ships, to take them from within, yet ... he’d always thought that it wouldn’t be possible.  Once they see us, they’ll know what we have in mind.

“Prepare to decloak,” he ordered.  “On my mark ...”

The last moments ticked away.  Admiral He felt his thoughts harden.  There’d been no technical difficulty in sneaking an attack fleet into the system ... had one of the other powers had the same idea?  It wasn’t impossible.  The spheres represented a treasure trove as alluring as a virgin land, teeming with fertile farmland, raw materials and an unarmed population that could be effectively enslaved without a fight.  There’d be no hesitation in taking it too.  He’d studied history.  The strong took what they wanted and invented justifications afterwards, if they felt the urge to bother.  The idea the weak should be left alone was ... sweet, he conceded, but unlikely to get any real traction.  There was always an excuse to impose one’s will on people who couldn’t defend themselves, an excuse that could be used to justify anything ... up to and including genocide.  Who cared about abstract principles when wealth, power and political standing were at stake?

And we’re about to find out, he thought.  His masters had thought the Russians, or the French, might be putting together their own task forces.  He’d be astonished if the British and Americans weren’t drawing up contingency plans to do the same.  If they sent their own cloaked fleets ...

An alarm sounded.  “Admiral,” the tactical officer snapped.  “They’re bringing their tactical sensors online!”

Admiral He kept his expression blank through sheer force of will.  The fleet wasn’t close enough to be detected, not with low-level active sensors.  He’d ordered his foreign subordinates to keep their sensors stepped down as they swept the sphere, citing the risk of drawing attention from the Builders.  Admiral Dismukes believed the super-aliens were gone, and Admiral He tended to agree, but it had made a convenient excuse that couldn’t really be opposed.  And yet ... how the hell had the foreigners detected the fleet?  It couldn’t possibly be a coincidence.  There was certainly no other reason to break the survey fleet’s operating protocols ...

Endeavour is a survey ship, he thought.  It’s possible she’s carrying more advanced sensors than we knew.

There was no time to worry about it.  The longer he delayed, the greater the risk of his bloodless coup turning into a bloody slaughter.  “Drop the cloak,” he ordered.  “Bring tactical sensors online.  Launch fighters.”

“Aye, Admiral.”

Admiral He leaned forward as the tactical display sharpened.  The enemy ships – he had to start thinking of them as enemies now, even though it went against the grain – were trapped against the sphere, a tactical nightmare they’d be unable to escape before it was far too late.  It was rare for an attacking fleet to risk pinning their enemies against a planet – a stray missile could inflict untold damage on the planetary ecosystem – but the sphere was effectively indestructible.  His fleet could pound on the shell for years and not even scratch the surface.  It ensured a stray missile wouldn’t pose a threat to anything worth mentioning.

“Open a general channel, to all ships,” he said.  He waited for the signal, then went on.  “This is Admiral He.  This system is now under my authority.  You are ordered to stand down your weapons and defences and prepare to be boarded.  If you comply, no harm will come to you and you will be returned to your homes as soon as possible.  Failure to comply will result in the destruction of your ships and crews.  You have five minutes to reply.”

He nodded to the communications officer, who closed the channel, then leaned back in his chair and hoped the foreigners saw sense.  He had more than enough firepower to win the coming engagement, unless the enemy had cloaked fleets of their own, but it would be needlessly wasteful, particularly if the tramlines couldn’t be restored in a hurry.  There were contingency plans for that, yet ... his claim to being a rogue warlord, a fig-leaf that would allow his government to disown him if the gambit failed, might become the de facto truth.  If they couldn’t get back in touch with Earth ...

“No response, Admiral,” the communications officer said.  “However, I am picking up increased encrypted transmissions between the enemy ships.”

We caught them with their pants down, Admiral He thought.  If they’d had any warning, they’d have set up laser networks before we showed our hand and we wouldn’t pick up anything.

He cursed his luck as the seconds ticked down to zero.  They’d been detected early – somehow – and that meant he didn’t have their fleet so perfectly pinned their only option was to surrender, if they didn’t want to be slaughtered.  The enemy could put up a fight, if they wished, or even try to escape.  He doubted the latter was possible, but it was difficult to be sure.  Space engagements tended to be chancy things, particularly in a system where stunts like losing one’s pursuers in an asteroid belt or using a piece of debris to mount an ambush were possible.  He’d read the reports from the so-called scavengers – in reality, advance parties dispatched by his superiors – and had been struck by how cramped the system was.  One didn’t have to have all the skill and determination of black colonists, setting up a hidden colony, to survive ...

“Admiral,” the tactical officer said.  “Curtis is launching gunboats.”

Admiral He swore.  “General signal,” he ordered.  “All units are cleared to engage as planned.”

“Aye, Admiral.”

***

“Launch gunboats,” Captain Hector Howard snapped.  “Prepare to engage!”

He cursed savagely.  He’d never expected treachery, certainly not on such a scale.  Everyone knew the score.  Spying was fine, a certain amount of pushing and shoving and even sabre-rattling for position was fine, but outright starting a war?  The Indians had fought and lost a limited war for limited aims; the Chinese, it seemed, were gambling everything on one throw of the die.  There was no way it was a rogue action.  They’d sent a carrier, two battleships and at least seven smaller ships to the spheres, without declaring them to the world.  And that meant ...

I’ll probably be court-martialled when I get home, he thought, although he was experienced enough to know the odds of survival weren’t in his favour.  My career is deader than dead.

He scowled as the display updated, the Chinese starfighters accelerating rapidly to close the range.  Admiral He had been clever, very clever.  The rest of the MNF was pinned against the sphere, caught with their pants down.  His court-martial would probably be the shortest formality on record, even though he’d had no reason to reject the orders that had put him in such a tactically disastrous position.  His superiors would probably court-martial him even if he didn’t last long enough to face a court.  They’d want to make it very clear his missteps could not be repeated.  And yet ...

I had no reason to think I should have kept my gunboats on standby, let alone deployed, he thought, bitterly.  His pilots were rushing to their craft – the two ready craft were already spiralling out into space – but it was too late.  He’d be lucky if he managed to get the rest of the gunboats out before the Chinese opened fire.  They’re going to slaughter us.

“Captain, the tactical command and communications datanet has crashed,” the communications officer snapped.  “I have multiple invasive programs running wild ...”

“Purge the system, set up laser command links,” Hector ordered.  The Chinese had full access to the command datanet, more than enough to prep it to crash at the worst possible moment.  Their jammers were coming online too, making it harder to set up backup command datalinks.  The odds were growing worse with every passing second.  The MNF, already badly outgunned, wasn’t going to be able to work as a team.  “Bring missile batteries online, prepare to fire.”

“Aye, Captain.”

At least the range is close enough we don’t have to worry about targets, he thought, grimly.  It might not save his ship, but it might give the rest of the flotilla a fighting chance.  We can use the gunboats to cover our hulls.

“Captain, I’ve lost the link to Endeavour,” the communications officer said.  “The admiral is out of contact.”

The admiral wasn’t issuing any orders, Hector thought sourly.  Admiral Dismukes was a surprisingly good diplomat, and a decent organiser, but he was no tactician.  The most he could do was surrender.  Hector had no illusions about what would happen to his crews, if he ran up the white flag.  The Chinese had committed themselves.  The best the crew could hope for was being shipped to the sphere and even that was unlikely.  They can’t risk any witnesses getting home to tell the tale.

“Keep trying to re-establish the datalinks,” Hector ordered.  “And get the rest of the gunboats into space!”

His mind raced.  How long did they have?  Not long.  At least one ship had already lost power ... he cursed again, wondering how the Chinese had done that.  An undercover deep-cover agent?  Or an unwilling traitor, conditioned to betray his comrades when the shit hit the fan?  Or ...  The flotilla was more vulnerable to a deceitful ally than it was to an entire enemy fleet.  An ally had plenty of time to note communications codes and find backdoors into datanodes, access points that weren’t supposed to exist but everyone knew were there anyway.  It would take time to repair the damage, time they simply didn’t have ...

The display flared.  “Captain,” the tactical officer said.  “The Chinese have opened fire.”

“Return fire,” Hector ordered.  Curtis was outgunned, but she had one edge.  The range was so close she could fire her missiles on sprint mode, reducing the time to target and making it harder for the Chinese to shoot them down.  “Target the carrier.”

“Aye, Captain,” the tactical officer said.

Hector heard the doubt in the man’s voice, even though he hurried to obey.  He’d be right to doubt, normally.  The battleships – hulking behemoths, each crammed with more firepower than the entire MNF – were the immediate threat, but the carrier and her starfighters posed a greater threat in the long-term.  They could be used to run down the smaller ships, preventing the flotilla’s destroyers from breaking contact and running to hide in the vastness of interstellar space.  There’d be no hope of them getting back to Earth without the tramline, certainly not in time to matter, but if the tramline was restored ... his lips curved into a savage smile.  The Chinese had just picked a fight with the entire world.  He might not live to see it, but they’d pay.  By God, they’d pay.

Curtis shuddered.  “Missiles away,” the tactical officer reported.  “The enemy is launching its own missiles.”

“The point defence datanet is still offline,” the communications officer added.  “We have no broadband links to the flotilla.”

“Deploy our point defence to cover our hull,” Hector ordered, stiffly.  “And ... general signal to the flotilla.  Any unit capable of running and hiding is to leave now.”

There was a pause.  “Aye, sir,” the communications officer said, finally.  “I ... signal sent.”

Hector snorted, inwardly.  The command network was down.  No one was really sure who was in effective command of the flotilla.  The jamming was just too intense.  He wasn’t certain his orders would be received, let alone followed.  The Chinese had done their work too well.  The only upside, he thought, was that there’d be no way to organise a quick surrender either.  His mind raced as he tried to find a better option or two, but there were none.  The tactical equation was brutally simple.  They either surrendered or died.

“Captain, the enemy starfighters are closing on our hull,” the tactical officer reported.  “The remainder of the gunboats are launching now.”

“Deploy missiles to cover them,” Hector ordered.  Using shipkiller missiles as anti-starfighter weapons was overkill, but it might just clear the way for the gunboats to get into open space.  If they were trapped against the ship’s hull, they’d be picked off before they could get into position and bring their weapons to bear on the Chinese.  Gunboats were slow, compared to starfighters, but they did have the great advantage of being able to fire in multiple directions at once.  “And key the point defence to engage the starfighters too.”

“Aye, Captain,” the tactical officer said.

Hector nodded as the range closed sharply.  The Chinese point defence was alarmingly good – they knew enough about American missiles to prep their defences to meet them – although he noted with some satisfaction a missile striking a launch tube and hopefully putting it out of action for a few weeks.  The first blood had gone to them ... not that it mattered.  The Chinese battleships were belching more missiles, without even waiting to see the results of their first salvo.  He had to admire their willingness to expend so many missiles without being sure there’d be anything for them to hit.  If he’d done that, the beancounters would have had a fit. 

The display flashed a warning, an instant before a missile slammed into his hull and detonated.  Red lights flared up on the status board, the damage rapidly mounting up.  A handful of lights vanished, as internal communications links were re-established and confirmed the damage wasn’t as bad as the first reports had suggested, but the remainder remained stubbornly present.  Two more missiles slammed home in quick succession, one striking the launch ring before the final gunboats could make their escape.  One was blown away, the other tossed into space.  Hector hoped the crew had survived.  They might last long enough to escape, or at least hurt the Chinese before they died.

Another impact rocked the ship, harder this time.  “Direct hit, rear drive nodes,” the damage control officer reported.  “Repair crews are on their way ...”

“Captain, enemy starfighters are closing,” the tactical officer put in.  “Gunboats are moving to intercept, but ... they’re being intercepted themselves.”

Hector gritted his teeth as the enemy starfighters volley-fired their torpedoes into his hull.  Their warheads were smaller than starship missiles, but it didn’t matter.  The damage kept mounting up, his point defence growing weaker and weaker as weapon pods were blown off the hull or power and coordination nodes were destroyed.  It was just a matter of time ...

His ship rocked again, a dull thump echoing through the hull.  The gravity flickered and started to die, the power being hastily redirected to other – more important – systems.  He heard the hull creak and knew the end had come.  The display was failing rapidly as more missiles slammed home ... he hoped, prayed, that they’d won enough time for the rest of the flotilla to scatter.  The Chinese had gambled.  If a single ship survived to report home, they’d make damn sure the gamble didn’t pay off.

“All hands, abandon ship,” he ordered.  He flipped up a concealed section of the command chair and hit the switches underneath, triggering destruct charges within the ship’s surviving datacores.  There’d be nothing for the Chinese to recover, if they managed to board and search his ship.  “I say again, all hands abandon ship.”

He took a breath.  “Helm, fire the manoeuvring thrusters,” he added.  “Point us at the sphere.”

“Aye, Captain.”

Hector nodded.  He’d done everything he could.  Curtis might actually survive striking the sphere – the thrusters didn’t have enough push to guarantee the ship’s destruction – but the Chinese would have very real problems trying to salvage his ship.  They’d be better off abandoning her, or even nuking the hulk ... if he was lucky, it would raise questions when – if – Earth sent more ships to the sphere.  It wasn’t much of a plan, but it would have to do.

Let’s hope the Chinese treat prisoners well, he thought.  His earlier thoughts mocked him.  The Chinese might not be zombies, intent on creating more of their kind, or sadistic Jihadists who gloried in crimes against humanity, but they had good reason to make sure none of his crew ever returned home.  Who knows?  If they can’t make contact with Earth, they’re going to need us.

Chapter Thirty-One: The Hatch, Dyson System

Staci watched in horror and white-hot rage as the Chinese opened fire.

She hadn’t known who was creeping up on the sphere, not until the Chinese had dropped their cloaks and revealed themselves.  The new sensors hadn’t been able to do more than detect the fleet’s presence ... her mind raced, searching for tactical options as the Chinese transmitted their demand and then opened fire.  She had to admire their planning, she conceded ruefully, although she was pissed at just how badly they’d broken the treaty.  The MNF was both concentrated and scattered, too close to the Chinese to escape and yet unable to coordinate an effective defence.  Curtis and the rest of the fleet were alone in a crowd, unable to link their defences into a single entity ...

Admiral Dismukes’ face materialised next to her.  “Captain, we have been unable to re-establish the command network,” he said, grimly.  “We are out of contact with the flotilla.”

“The radio network is down,” Staci agreed.  She was surprised the jamming hadn’t drawn the fists ... but perhaps the alien artefacts only operated within the sphere.  If there were any fists orbiting Dyson One, they were dead and cold and undiscovered.  “There is no way we can rebuild it in time.”

Her mind raced, searching for options.  The Chinese would be able to track Endeavour, even if she cloaked and tried to sneak away.  Staci had no illusions.  They might be able to outrun the carrier or the battleships, but the remainder of the fleet and the carrier’s starfighters would have no trouble running the survey ship down.  Endeavour wasn’t designed for open combat.  Staci would have risked it in Unicorn, if she’d been in command of the tiny frigate, but not Endeavour.  There was no way to get clear and break contact ... and nowhere to go, even if they did.  The tramlines were gone.

“Admiral, we need to get back into the sphere,” she said.  The irony would have made her laugh if the situation wasn’t so desperate.  They’d taken a huge risk in getting out of the sphere and now they were trying to get back in.  “If we can get into the sphere and shut the hatch ...”

The admiral looked as if he wanted to dither.  Staci cursed under her breath.  Admiral Dismukes really wasn’t a tactical expert and the ship was running out of time.  Curtis was already taking heavy damage – she was closely akin to Lion, close enough that Staci suspected the damage was fatal – and the moment she was gone, the Chinese would rip apart the remainder of the flotilla, if they didn’t surrender.  Hell, the ships inside the sphere didn’t even know anything had changed.  They had to be warned.

She raised her voice.  “Helm, reverse course,” she ordered.  “Take us back into the sphere.”

“Aye, Captain,” Atkinson said.

Admiral Dismukes nodded as the survey ship slowly glided back into the sphere.  Staci allowed herself a moment of relief.  She was the commanding officer – Admiral Dismukes had no contact with the rest of the fleet, and there was nothing he could do even if the datanet was still online – but it would have been awkward if he’d objected.  It would certainly have caused diplomatic headaches, although nothing compared to the problems caused by Admiral He’s treachery.  Staci had no idea if his actions were sanctioned by the Chinese Government– the tramlines were gone, preventing any further contact with Earth – but the presence of a whole fleet suggested a degree of preplanning.  She doubted he’d done it on his own.  If nothing else, he couldn’t have rounded up an entire fleet without the government’s permission.

And then they shadowed us all the way here, she thought, numbly.  They wouldn’t even need to stay close.  They know the tramlines as well as we do.

“Signal the base camp,” Staci said evenly.  “Order the away team to close the hatch.”

“Aye, Captain,” MacPhee said.  “I’m re-establishing the laser-link now.”

Staci gritted her teeth.  The perspective was shifting again – she was piloting her way through the hatch, yet also plunging into the unknown – but ... she shook her head, watching in horror as Curtis glided down to the surface and crashed into the sphere.  If there was any damage to the shell, it wasn’t immediately apparent.  A handful of lifepods were clearly visible, beacons signalling frantically for help.  She hoped the Chinese had the time and inclination to pick them up, rather than leave the helpless crewmen to die in the merciless vacuum of space.  It went against the grain to leave them behind, but she had no choice.  She knew what would happen if those battleships got into firing range.

“Link established,” MacPhee said.  “I’ve sent the signal.”

Jenner glanced at her.  “Captain, they might not be able to close the hatch.”

“I know.”  Staci had already considered the possibility, then dismissed it as something outside her control.  The researchers had been given strict orders not to do anything that might close the hatch ... in hindsight, that had been a mistake.  An understandable mistake, perhaps, but a mistake nonetheless.  “We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.”

She forced herself to think.  If they closed the hatch, they would be safe ... unless the Chinese found a way to open it from the outside.  She thought it wasn’t possible, but there was no way to be sure.  If not, they could concentrate on re-establishing the tramlines and then jumping home, carrying word of Chinese treachery to their superiors.  It wasn’t a perfect plan, but she couldn’t think of anything else.  Reopening the hatch would be a deadly mistake unless they managed to figure out a way to take control of the automated defences, then turn them on their enemies.  She had no idea if that were even possible.  But ...

Maybe there’s another option, she thought.  But the timing would have to be just right.

***

Admiral He felt a twinge of guilt as Curtis struck the sphere, the starship’s hull crumpling in a manner that reminded him of a wet-navy ship hitting the bottom, rather than an interplanetary starship meeting her doom.  He was surprised the Americans hadn’t hit the self-destruct, although the Americans did tend to be sentimental about their crews and willing to risk everything just to save a handful of lives from near-certain death.  His tactical sensors were already reporting a handful of lifepods, screaming for help.  He tapped his console, ordering the starfighters to pick up the pods and tow them away from the sphere.  The security troops could take the Americans – and the rest of the survivors – into custody and hold them until a final decision could be made about their fate.  He didn’t want to liquidate the prisoners unless there was no other choice.

“Admiral,” the tactical officer said.  “Endeavour is returning to the sphere.”

Admiral He blinked.  The survey ship wasn’t precisely a civilian vessel – she was very clearly a military ship – but she wasn’t designed for combat and she had a large number of civilians onboard.  Captain Templeton might be a decorated military officer, yet ... surely, she’d see sense and surrender.  Going back into the sphere ... it was unexpected, he conceded in the privacy of his own kind, but futile.  Unless ...

A thrill of alarm ran through him.  Unless they can close the hatch.

“Dispatch a cruiser after her,” he snapped.  They didn’t dare let the British close the hatch or the entire operation would fail.  The best they could hope for was stalemate and that was dangerously optimistic.  “And follow up with two troop transports and a battleship.”

He hesitated, caught between conflicting priorities.  He’d wiped out most of the MNF, but a handful of ships remained ... and, of course, there were a number of independent scavengers lurking within the shattered sphere.  He had to deal with them, but he also had to gain control of the sphere’s command centres – it was lucky they’d gotten most of the data download from Endeavour before the fleet had been detected, ensuring they didn’t have to start from scratch – and leaving another officer to handle the task could blow up in his face.  It was possible it might anger the Builders, if they were still around, but also possible it would give that new officer a chance to take his place.  The government would pass judgement, when they returned home, and if someone else stole the credit ...

“Deploy the unattached starfighters to take out the surviving ships,” he ordered.  Hopefully, making a song and dance about recovering lifepods and taking prisoners would convince the holdouts that surrender was a viable option, although he knew better than to assume they’d give up.  “And then position the remaining capital ships near the hatch.”

“Aye, Admiral.”

He leaned back in his chair, considering.  The ambush had been costlier than he’d hoped, with his carrier taking two hits – one of which would need weeks to repair – and a destroyer blown out of space with a direct hit.  Preliminary analysis suggested the missile hadn’t even been aimed at the destroyer, the kind of coincidence that happened a great deal more often than civilians tended to appreciate.  He’d won, but his hopes of a bloodless victory hadn’t been realised and they’d have to do a lot of cleaning up before the tramlines were restored.  Curtis would have to be nuked, if the hulk couldn’t be towed back into space and then steered into the sun.  The evidence had to be buried, whatever the cost. 

His minder cleared his throat.  “A successful operation, Admiral?”

“It is not yet completed,” Admiral He said.  A thought ran through his mind.  If they really had lost contact with Earth, the minder was going to suffer an accident.  A tragic accident that couldn’t possibly be blamed on anything, save for his own stupidity.  “We need to run the survey ship and the rest of the flotilla down before we can declare victory.”

***

“Captain,” Helen Yang said.  “There is at least one enemy ship on our tail.”

Staci swore.  “They’re coming into the sphere?”

“Yes, Captain,” Helen reported.  “They’ll be through the hatch in seven minutes.”

“Contact the outpost,” Staci said.  “Order them to expedite.”

“Aye, Captain,” MacPhee said.

Staci cursed under her breath as Endeavour picked up speed.  She was already clear of the hatch, far enough from the surface to risk using her cloaking device, but she couldn’t hope to outrun the enemy ship.  It looked like a cruiser, judging by her power curves.  She was more of a match for Endeavour than her bigger sisters, but she could certainly take a bite out of the survey ship even if she didn’t destroy her.  Staci wondered, grimly, how the Builders or their automated defences would react to outright war within the sphere.  They’d certainly be drawn to tactical sensors and radio transmissions ...

We keep getting tripped up by the sheer size of the sphere, she thought.  A nuclear blast is a serious problem on Earth, but nothing more than a pinprick in interstellar space – or inside the sphere.  They might not even notice.

“Captain,” Helen said.  “I’m picking up two more ships heading to the hatch.  One of them appears to be a heavy transport.”

“Probably crammed with troops,” Admiral Dismukes said.

Staci nodded.  The Chinese might not have had time to read the data Endeavour had sent, when everything had seemed right with the world, but intentionally or not they’d put themselves in a very strong position.  The hatch wasn’t closing, which meant they’d not only be able to blockade the sphere and keep the remainder of the flotilla trapped – about the only time in history an interstellar blockade had been genuinely effective – but also seize the base camp on top of the mountain before flowing down to capture the lower camp and the alien command centre.  She hoped they’d make a transmission that would get them killed – she had no idea how good their communications discipline was, or if they realised that radio signals would draw fire from the alien weapons platforms – but it was likely to be a two-edged sword if they did.  The alien weapons were powerful enough to devastate the entire region. 

Like using nukes to swat flies, she thought.  It seemed insane, but she thought she understood their thinking.  If they wanted to make damn sure that no technological knowledge spread on the sphere, turning the entire area into debris would be one way to do it.

“Signal the base camp,” she ordered.  “The upper camp is to evacuate, either into the shuttles or down to the ground.  The lower camp is to evacuate into the undergrowth and hold out as long as possible.”

Her mind raced.  There were soldiers on the ground – Royal Marines, USMC, a handful of others – but they had very few heavy weapons.  There’d seemed no need to bring antiaircraft missiles or artillery, both of which the Chinese would have in abundance. Probably.  The lack of communications would cause no end of difficulties too, although the Chinese would have the same problem.  Who knew?  Perhaps someone would deliberately make a radio transmission that would draw fire from the weapons platforms.  It had been done before ...

A nasty thought crossed her mind. “Tactical, prepare a screamer for launch,” she ordered, coldly.  “Be ready to fire on my command.”

“Aye, Captain,” McDougall said.

Staci nodded, watching grimly as the Chinese ships started to enter the sphere.  The hatch remained resolutely open.  The Chinese didn’t seem inclined to take it for granted – their cruiser was accelerating rapidly, as if they thought the hatch would close or the gravity would twist at any moment – something she would have applauded if they weren’t coming to kill her.  Her mind raced as she considered the variables, juggling them in her head. The timing was appalling.  A few more minutes could have given them enough of a head start to escape, to get clear and go doggo ... it was not to be.  The Chinese had timed their operation very well.

“The troop transport is holding position within the funnel,” Helen noted.  “I think she’s dispatching commandos.”

“Noted,” Staci said.  There was nothing she could do about it now.  The base camp hadn’t been rigged for a hasty exit and demolition and there was no time to correct that oversight, not now.  Whatever the Chinese were thinking, decades of trust born of standing together against common foes had been thrown away in a heartbeat.  “The cruiser?”

“Still accelerating,” Helen said.  “She’ll be in firing range in ten minutes.”

“Tactical, deploy the screamer,” Staci ordered.  “Aim to keep the cruiser between the screamer and the nearest fist.”

McDougall sucked in his breath.  “Aye, Captain.”

Staci gritted her teeth.  The cruiser was showing up clearly now, a mass of death and destruction that could cripple or kill her ship.  Even if she won the engagement, she’d take heavy losses and be unable to escape the battleship, or even a destroyer, when they came knocking.  Staci hoped the other ships had had a chance to escape, or to shut down their drives as much as possible and hope for the best.  It was going to be an absolute nightmare.  The only upside was that the Chinese wouldn’t be able to use active sensors to track them down. 

If this works, we might have a chance, she thought, bitterly.  If this fails, we’ll have a flat choice between a futile death and surrender.

She watched the lines converge as the cruiser continued to accelerate, pushing her drives further than Staci had ever dared.  A ship moving at a respectable clip within the sphere might draw attention, after all.  Might.  Her lips twitched in dark amusement.  The Chinese ship was about to draw attention, if her plan worked.  It might not, not completely, but a few seconds of distraction would give her a chance to cut and run.  But she didn’t have anywhere to go.

“Captain,” MacPhee said.  “They just hit us with a signalling laser.  They’re ordering us to stand down our drives and prepare to be boarded.”

“Stall them,” Staci ordered.  It was dirty pool, technically, but they weren’t going to see home again if they surrendered.  “Tactical?”

“The screamer is in position, Captain,” McDougall said.  “She’s ready to go.”

Staci nodded.  “Activate the screamer.”

She braced herself.  Screamers were little more than remote broadcasters, designed to attract attention.  They were only used, normally, in situations where it wasn't clear who’d be looking – or why.  It had been sheer luck Endeavour carried some, luck that owed more to bureaucratic oversight than anything else.  The Chinese ship didn’t flinch as the screamer started to scream, but her imagination insisted it had.  If they knew what was about to happen ...

“Captain,” Yang said.  “A fist is moving to intercept.”

“Keep the screamer in position,” Staci ordered. 

She smiled, coldly.  The Chinese hadn’t seen the fists, not in real life.  Their sheer speed was something no recording could convey.  The smart thing to do would be to take out the screamer, then evade the fist as best as possible.  Instead, they fired on the fist.  It shrugged off the nuclear blasts and kept coming, striking the Chinese ship at a respectable fraction of the speed of light.  The cruiser’s icon vanished from the display.

“She’s gone, Captain,” McDougall said.  “The cruiser and the screamer.”

Staci said nothing for a long moment.  The icon had vanished so bloodlessly ... it didn’t show the crew being wiped from existence, wiped out so quickly they’d barely had any time to realise they were doomed.  How many Chinese had she just killed?  She didn’t know.  But she was sure the Chinese had killed more on Curtis and the rest of the MNF ...

“Helm, alter course to the RV point,” she ordered.  “Tactical, take us into cloak.”

“Aye, Captain,” McDougall said.  “They should have lost their passive sensor lock.”

“Good,” Staci said.  “That’ll give us some time to decide what to do next.”

Chapter Thirty-Two: The Hatch, Dyson System

Admiral He’s good mood vanished in an instant.  “Chongqing’s gone?”

“Yes, Admiral,” the sensor officer said.  The man’s voice shook.  It wasn’t uncommon for admirals to blame their subordinates for bad news, even though they’d done nothing beyond reporting it.  China was unforgiving to failures and if avoiding punishment meant throwing someone else under the spotlights ... admirals did it without hesitation.  “She ... she’s barely even atoms.”

Admiral He said nothing, calming himself with an effort.  He’d seen the sensor images, from Endeavour and Haikou, but they hadn’t conveyed the reality of kinetic weapons that flew at impossible speeds and survived impacts that would have reduced a human starship to atoms.  Had reduced a starship to atoms.  Chongqing had been a modern cruiser, tough enough to beat anything smaller than a battleship and fast enough to outrun anything capable of taking it out one-on-one, but she’d been effortlessly destroyed by the alien weapons.  There was something almost obscene about the way the fist was circling back into position, as if it hadn’t just killed an entire cruiser and her crew.  A normal kinetic weapon would not have survived the impact.  The fist had not only survived, it hadn’t even been scratched.

“Remind all units to keep their active transmitters deactivated,” he ordered.  “And inform the troops they are to continue to secure the base camps.”

“Aye, Admiral,” the communications officer said.

Admiral He nodded, keeping his displeasure off his face.  Endeavour was gone, hiding within the sphere ... it sounded laughable until one considered the sheer size of the megastructure.  One might as easily find a specific ant on Earth’s surface ... as long as the British ship kept her drives and sensors stepped down, she’d be practically undetectable.  And yet, there was no other way out of the sphere.  She’d have to find a way back through the hatch if she wanted to get out.  What was her commander thinking?  Did she think she could turn the tramlines back on?

Perhaps, he thought.  The operation hung in the balance.  He’d done well – he knew it – but the trap hadn’t been closed properly.  The longer it took to hunt the rogue units down, the greater the chance something would go wrong, something that would prove impossible to fix.  Time does not favour us.

He sighed inwardly, leaning back in the command chair.  He’d have to wait.  His analysts were already scanning the data download from Endeavour, updating what they’d already known and assessing the new data.  They were professionally paranoid, and they’d check and recheck everything before they staked their careers on it, but ... there was no reason to think there was anything wrong with the data.  Endeavour and her crew hadn’t known they were flying straight into an ambush, when they’d opened the hatch.  How could they?  They’d been completely isolated, trapped inside the sphere.  No, there was no reason to think the data was compromised.  It could be trusted.

Good, he thought, as the security troops advanced towards the base camp.  We can use it to plan our next move.

***

“The moral of today’s story,” Colin snapped, as he threw his carryall into a storage locker and sat hastily on a flight seat, “is never trust anyone.”

Tobias couldn’t disagree.  He’d been as surprised as anyone else when the fighting had started – he’d seen enough, from their position at the upper base camp, to know it had been at point-blank range and bloody lethal – but he supposed he should have seen it coming.  The Chinese were bullies, everyone knew it, and like all bullies they thought they could get away with anything as long as the price of stopping them was greater than the cost of putting up with them.  He’d met people whose ancestors had escaped Hong Kong, after the crackdown, and they’d bitterly reported that the agreements the Chinese government had made with the locals had lasted precisely as long as the government had wanted and not a step beyond.  He didn’t know why anyone had been really surprised.  The interstellar wars had forced the Chinese to cooperate with the rest of the human race, but that hadn’t lasted.  They were clearly making their bid for supreme power now.

He keyed his console, bringing the shuttle to life.  It had been sheer, bad luck that he’d been ordered to pick up Colin and his squad, as well as a handful of researchers, in hopes they’d be able to brief follow-up teams on their discoveries before returning to the alien structure.  That had gone by the wayside now, Tobias was sure, but instead ... he kept a wary eye on the advancing Chinese ships as he disconnected the shuttle from the airlock, hoping to hell the life support lasted long enough to get them somewhere safe.  Perhaps it would have been better to flee down the mountainside instead, but there hadn’t been time.  The choice was stark, between going into a Chinese POW camp or fleeing into the sphere ... he wondered, sourly, if he wouldn’t have preferred the camp.  Perhaps if it had been just him ... but it wasn’t.  Marigold was with him and if half the stories about Chinese prisons were true ...

“Get belted down,” he called.  The shuttle was overloaded.  If they had to land on the surface ... not that that was going to happen, not as anything less than a final resort.  The alien weapons platforms would vaporise them.  “We need to go now!”

“We have incoming,” Marigold said.  “Suited troopers.”

“Security troops,” Colin said.  “They’re supposed to be security, not military, and not as tough as us.”

Tobias said nothing as he gunned the engine.  A few years ago, he would have assumed Colin was bullshitting, insisting he could take all comers even though he was little better than a street thug, perhaps not even that.  Now ... he suspected it didn’t matter.  He was a good shot and Marigold was better, and the Royal Marines were better still, but they were all crammed into a lone shuttle that was probably being targeted even as they drove into empty space.  A single hit would be enough to get them killed, either blowing them out of space or forcing them to crash on the sphere.  He didn’t want to go through that again, not ever.  The risk of being trapped permanently was too high.

The display bleeped.  “A fist killed a Chinese ship,” Marigold said.  “She’s nothing more than atoms.”

“Good,” Colin said, savagely.

Tobias kept his thoughts to himself.  The cruiser would have posed a serious problem, if she’d tried to intercept them, but ... she’d also been crewed by human beings.  She wasn’t – hadn’t been – an alien ship, nor one manned by infected humans who were nothing more than hosts for an alien virus.  Seeing them get swatted effortlessly was ... he shook his head.  Colin was right.  The cruiser could have killed the shuttle and her entire crew without difficulty or forced them to surrender.  Either way, it would have ended badly.

“They’re swarming the base camp,” Marigold observed.  “Did we leave anything incriminating behind?”

“Probably,” Colin said.  “We destroyed the datacores as we fled, but there was no time to either vacuum the living pods or shatter the entire complex.  There could be anything left behind, from offline copies of hard data to research papers that weren’t filed properly.”

“Or stacks of porn,” another marine put in.  “That’ll keep them busy for a bit.”

“Or revolt them so much they get sick,” a third marine joked.  “I’ve seen your collection, Bruno.  The moment they take a look they’ll all throw up in unison.”

Tobias shuddered.  He didn’t want to think about it.

“Knock it off, you two,” Colin ordered.  “The pilots need to concentrate.”

Thanks, Tobias thought, sourly.

His mind raced as they flew into the sphere.  The Chinese weren’t giving chase, as far as he could tell, although he knew better than to take it for granted.  They could have shot a probe after him, even though the probe would have trouble reporting back without sending radio messages that would get it destroyed.  Perhaps that was the plan.  They might feel they could compress the message, then write off the drone.  Or ... his heart sank as he recalled the enemy carrier they’d briefly seen.  She’d remained outside the sphere, but there was no reason she couldn’t send her fighters after them.  Or gunboats, if they had any.  The Chinese could have forced Curtis to surrender and then commandeered her gunboats, if they didn’t have any of their own.  He wouldn’t know until the Chinese showed their hand.

“The screen is clear,” Marigold said.  “They shouldn’t be able to catch us without showing themselves.”

Tobias hoped she was right.  The shuttle was stealthed – the craft was too small to carry a proper cloaking device – but it was difficult to be sure she couldn’t be tracked.  The sooner they reached the RV point, the better.  They had a bunch of decoy systems, but they didn’t dare use them.  They’d almost certainly draw hostile attention from the alien defences.  If the Chinese came after them ... they could try to use the decoys to point the alien defences at the Chinese, but the Chinese had already seen that trick.  He didn’t think it would work twice.

Colin cleared his throat.  “We’re clear?”

“I think so,” Tobias said, reluctantly.  Half of their tricks were denied to them and the other half, he feared, would be useless.  “The longer they take to come after us, the greater the chance we can lose ourselves within the sphere.”

“I thought we were heading to Endeavour,” Colin said, puzzled.

“We are,” Tobias said.  They’d been told to make their way to a specific RV point – and not to let themselves be tracked there.  “But we’re going the long way around.”

“Got it,” Colin said.  “Is there anything we can do to help?”

“No.”  Tobias shook his head.  The marines and researchers were just passengers now.  The only thing they could do was pray and Tobias rather suspected no one would be listening.  It was hard to be religious, as someone had once pointed out to him, when certain people weren’t vaporised by lightning bolts.  “Not unless you want to get outside and push.”

Colin laughed, but there was a hard edge to it.  “We’ll wait,” he said.  “Just keep moving.”

Tobias rolled his eyes.  What else could they do?

***

Specialist Zhuan Yazhu hadn’t been sure what to expect, as he’d flown towards the base camp and forced his way into the airlock.  The MNF had their fair share of Special Forces, all of whom were trained to destroy anything useful, lay booby traps and generally make life miserable for anyone who tried to follow them too closely.  Zhuan couldn’t help feeling nervous, even though he was an experienced paramilitary officer.  The security troops were intended to keep the peace by patrolling the streets, crushing riots and arresting anyone who caused even the slightest hint of trouble, not take the lead against trained and experienced enemy soldiers.  Zhuan had gunned down protestors and infected in a handful of cities – officially, they’d all been infected – and he’d assisted with population relocations in the far west, but this was different.  If it hadn’t been for his unit having a degree of space training, he thought they’d never have been earmarked for the mission.  But then, sharing his doubts would have killed his career.  He’d be lucky if he hadn’t just been assigned to a punishment battalion and put to work clearing mines, scouting enemy positions and all the other tasks that were designed to get him killed before his sentence ran out.

The airlock opened without a hitch, somewhat to his surprise.  Nothing exploded in his face, or tried to tear his suit, or hurl him back into vacuum.  The habitat pod was a simple design, not particularly different from its Chinese counterpart, although there were a handful of hints of luxury.  A handful of shattered datachips lay on the floor, probably yanked from the processors and deliberately destroyed in the last moments before the naval crew abandoned the camp.  He nosed his way into the sleeping compartment and raised an eyebrow.  The signs of a hasty escape were everywhere, from bedding scattered on the ground to a half-eaten ration pack left on the table.  It looked a bigger compartment than anything he’d ever enjoyed, certainly in space.  They’d been told to clear their own living space during the relocations and they’d done that with gusto.  His lips twitched in happy memory.

He glanced back as the rest of the assault squad flowed into the base camp, followed by a pair of combat engineers carrying a laser transmitter between them.  They’d been told, in no uncertain terms, not to use any sort of radio, whatever the situation.  The radios had even been stripped out of their suits, something that bothered him at a very primal level.  He’d heard whispered rumours of men accidentally shooting themselves into space, their bodies never found ... condemned to drift helplessly until their air ran out, unless they killed themselves first.  The government insisted it never happened, but who knew?  Zhuan had served long enough to know there was a difference between what they were told and what they saw, from the willingness of the uprooted populations to be uprooted to the quality of their equipment.  He wasn’t fool enough to say it out loud.  The walls had ears.  Literally.

The engineers hastily set up their transmitter as the troops swept the rest of the upper camp.  There was nothing of great interest, beyond a pair of dirty magazines and a handful of datachips with erotic titles.  They'd have to be handed over to the intelligence staff, unfortunately.  Zhuan suspected all the warnings of the dangers of plugging unknown chips into computers and datapads were exaggerated, but it was unwise to test the theory too openly.  He knew how to use a datapad, yet not how it worked.  It was all too possible he’d make a serious mistake and wind up in very hot water.

“We have checked the cables,” the engineer reported.  “The funiculars appear to be in working order.”

Zhuan nodded and led his men to the cable car.  It looked like the monorails he’d seen in Shanghai, although there was something oddly crude about the design that puzzled him.  The engineers poked and prodded and confirmed, after much mumbling, that the line hadn’t been locked at the bottom.  Zhuan wondered, privately, if it was a trap, but he knew better than to say that out loud.  The next wave of invaders were already on the way and his superiors would be annoyed if they were delayed because of him.  He stepped into the car, took a seat and waited.  The car started to move a moment later, plunging down the mountainside.  He screwed his eyes shut as the shifting perspective started to fuck with his brain.  He’d been warned it would happen – he supposed his superiors had to get things right from time to time – but their words hadn’t conveyed the dagger in the mind sensation.  The sense they were moving faster and faster nagged at him, growing stronger until it was suddenly gone.  He opened his eyes in time to see the base camp at the bottom of the mountain come into view.  It looked deserted.

The car came to a halt at the bottom of the cable.  Zhuan forced himself to hurry out of the vehicle, despite his wobbly legs, and start sweeping the camp.  It had also been deserted in a hurry, he noted; there were very definite traces the occupants had downed tools and fled into the undergrowth, rather than stopping to put up a fight.  Had they gone south ... he shook his head, recalling one of his instructors pointing out that if one stood on the north pole you couldn’t go anywhere but south.  Was the mountain really the sphere’s north pole?  He couldn’t quite wrap his head around it.

He put the thought out of his head as he led the team through the camp.  There had been no attempt to destroy the buildings or the paper records, something the merest terrorist band in the far west knew to do.  The prefabricated barracks hadn’t been destroyed or booby-trapped ... his superiors had promised him the advantage of surprise and it seemed they really had been right.  And yet ...

They’ve walked away from their base camp and gone ... where?  Zhuan had no answer.  He hoped his superiors did.  Wherever they are, we must find them.

***

“The camps are deserted?”  Admiral He wasn’t sure if that was good news or bad.  “Both camps?”

“Yes, sir,” the communications officer reported.  “The camps show signs of having been abandoned in a hurry, and the intelligence staff believes they can learn a great deal from the remains, but they have been abandoned.  We don’t know where they’ve gone.”

“They’ll have fled to the alien base,” Admiral He said.  It was the most important place on the sphere, as far as they knew.  “How many troops do we have on the ground?”

“Two hundred, so far,” the liaison officer said.  “But light weapons only.  Heavier gear and more troops are on the way.”

“There’s also trade goods,” his minder said.  “We can make contact with the locals and convince them to join us.”

Admiral He nodded.  Sell weapons, but not ammunition.  Once the locals were hooked, they were fucked.  He’d seen it used before, on Earth and Vesy, and it would work even better here.  The locals would be enslaved, without ever formally becoming slaves ...

“See to it,” he ordered.  “And Endeavour?”

“Lost within the sphere,” the sensor officer reported.  “Our probes are still watching for her.”

Admiral He nodded.  “Find her,” he said.  He didn’t know how much trouble a handful of ships could cause, but he didn’t want to find out the hard way.  “And quickly.”

Chapter Thirty-Three: Local Settlement, Dyson System (Interior)

Charlotte was feeling more and more uneasily isolated with every passing hour.

She hadn’t really expected the hatch to be opened so quickly or she would have insisted on returning to Endeavour.  She had few illusions about how long it would take to crack even a tiny section of the alien systems, even if they were an intelligence test for someone born and raised on the sphere.  The explorers had the edge, she thought, because they had computers and a vast database to draw on, but she hadn’t been hopeful.  She’d spent her days talking to the locals, trying to build relationships and learning what little they knew about their own history.  It had been a difficult, almost impossible, task.  She was starting to think the locals simply didn’t have any sense of history, certainly not of anything that had happened more than one or two generations ago.  It was the kind of historical ignorance that had come very close to destroying the  Western World only a few, short decades ago. 

And then the hatch had opened.

She hadn’t insisted on returning to the base camp at once.  There’d been no point.  No tramlines meant there was no escape from the system, no hope of returning home before old age caught up with her.  Better to stay with the locals and probe what they knew, and see if they could set up trade links in case they needed to buy food, rather than waste her time swanning around the base camp.  She had no illusions about her role there.  She wasn’t a naval officer or a researcher or something – anything – that might be useful to the growing colony, particularly if they did remain trapped forever.  She wasn’t even a fertile young woman!  And then the reports of open fighting had come in ...

Charlotte hadn’t believed them, at first, but as the base camp fell silent it had become impossible to pretend nothing was happening.  She wasn’t sure what to do.  The landlines were down, there was no response when her escort tried the laser transmitter and using radio was just asking to be killed.  She’d thought about setting off to the alien structure, where they could at least link up with the research team, but even that was too dangerous to contemplate.  The Chinese might already be deploying orbital spies, watching for the slightest trace of movement.  Anything larger than a canoe was almost certain to draw attention.

And, worst of all, the locals were no longer talking to her.

It both bothered her and made her suspect something was badly wrong.  The locals might be ignorant, by her standards, but they weren’t stupid.  She’d kept her explanations of precisely where she’d come from very vague, yet it was quite possible someone had worked out the truth.  The locals were incredibly skilled at moving through the undergrowth without being spotted.  They might have sent scouts to track the walker’s passage back to the mountain and seen the base camp, perhaps even realised that the explorers came from the skies.  And then ... did they know there were different factions?  Did they think they could make a deal with the Chinese?

They might, she thought.  The locals had tried to buy weapons, after seeing an assault rifle take down a dinosaur with one shot.  Charlotte had refused, but the Chinese wouldn’t be as scrupulous.  On other worlds, they’d had no qualms about finding a local faction, giving it weapons and backing, then sending it out to rule their country for their new masters.  Why not try the same on the sphere?  It would work perfectly, as long as they didn’t draw fire from above.  And they might just get away with it too.

“My Lady,” Midshipwoman Yasmin Cotter said.  “They want you.”

Charlotte frowned.  The locals had given the explorers a small house.  The sociologists suggested it was intended as an embassy, although it was hard to be sure.  The local language was surprisingly simple, and easy to learn, but there were concepts hidden within local assumptions about how the world – the sphere – worked that she knew to take nothing for granted.  It was all too easy to assume that two people who spoke the same language shared a great many other things, even though common sense suggested otherwise.  Charlotte had met people who spoke the same language, yet had very different ideas of what constituted acceptable behaviour.  It was never easy to adapt when one person found the other’s ideas offensive as hell.

She stood, brushing down her tunic.  The shipsuit was tough enough to take a poison dart, or so she’d been assured, but her face and hair were uncovered.  Her lips quirked in droll amusement.  The local women went around topless, their breasts swinging freely in a manner she’d never dared emulate.  It suggested they weren’t worried about poison darts, although – to be fair – the locals didn’t have anything that could stop a dart before it poked someone’s skin.  They’d asked for armour, too.

A chill ran down her spine, despite the heat, as she followed the messenger through the local town.  There were few people in sight, neither the women who ran the city nor the men who hunted and foraged to feed their families.  The air felt ... ominous, as if the city was waiting for something to happen.  She recalled the city that had allied with the landing party, before turning on it, and shivered.  It felt as if this city was going to turn against them too.

Her heart sank, the moment she stepped into the building.  Three men waited for her, two wearing heavy armour and carrying weapons capable of slaughtering the entire town without breaking a sweat.  The third man, wearing a shipsuit like hers, was clearly Chinese.  His eyes flickered over Charlotte, then past her.  Charlotte scowled, despite herself, as she saw Anthelia step into the light.  The woman – Charlotte had dubbed her an ambassador, although it wasn’t clear if that was precisely what she was – had been her main contact, when she’d been trying to patch together an agreement.  That she’d now turned to the Chinese ...

“Lady Charlotte,” the third man said.  His English had a slight accent, one she couldn’t place, but she had no trouble understanding him.  “I have orders to take you into custody.  If you cooperate, you will be treated with respect.  If not, we will be forced to take steps.”

Truss me up like a chicken and carry me to the POW camp, Charlotte guessed.  Her mind raced, searching for options she knew didn’t exist.  She couldn’t hope to draw her pistol before the Chinese guards grabbed her and, even if she did, so what?  Her little popgun might be enough to dominate the local town, as long as her ammunition held out, but its bullets wouldn’t even scratch the armoured suits.  There’s no way out.

She took a breath.  “My people ...?”

“They’ll be treated well,” the Chinese man said.  Charlotte suspected he was a diplomat.  “If you come now, you will not be harmed.”

Charlotte looked past him.  The room was dark, but she could make out the shape of weapons lying on the table.  The Chinese had shown the weapons to the locals, she guessed, and offered to hand them over in exchange for the diplomatic team.  There was no point in trying to fight.  The locals had made their choice and ... Charlotte knew it would come back to bite them, when they realised they couldn’t produce ammunition for themselves, but for the moment the Chinese had the edge. 

“I’ll come with you, for the moment,” she said.  “However, I must caution you that my government will lodge a formal protest – and perhaps take other action – when word reaches Earth.”

The Chinese officer shrugged – they both knew there was no way word would be reaching Earth anytime soon – and motioned for her to follow.  Charlotte obeyed, reminding herself to keep her eyes open.  If the Chinese were reluctant to manhandle her, she might as well use it to her advantage.  Her heart sank as they walked to the edge of the town and the fields beyond.  Charlotte and her team had tried to be subtle, although the walker was as much of an outside context problem to the locals as the sphere was to the explorers, but the Chinese hadn’t bothered.  A small army of Chinese troops, backed up by armoured vehicles, sat in the field, guns swinging from side to side.  Charlotte had no idea how they’d stack up against the Royal Marines, or if their vehicles were armoured cars or actual tanks, but there was enough firepower in sight to take out every local city for hundreds of miles around.

And the locals might not even recognise the threat, she thought.  Swords were obvious weapons.  Guns weren’t, if you didn’t know what they were.  The locals might see the Chinese rifles and think they were little more than metal clubs.  She hoped they had enough sense not to push matters.  The Chinese wouldn’t hesitate to slaughter the locals if they got in their way.  This could end very badly.

They didn’t bother to cuff her, something that was either a gesture of respect or contempt, as they loaded her into a jeep and set off back to the mountain.  Charlotte kept watching, silently noting the transports heading in the other direction.  They looked primitive, but that made a certain kind of sense.  The tanks that had won the First World War, absurdly outdated by modern standards, would absolutely dominate the sphere, as long as the Builders didn’t take a hand.  The Chinese might even have stripped the radios from their vehicles, just to make sure they didn’t get vaporised by the weapons platforms.  There looked to be some confusion, as they reached the base camp, but she doubted it mattered.  There’d be no real resistance to the landing parties until it was too late.

Not that they’re taking any chances, she thought.  It was hard to be sure, but there were hundreds – perhaps thousands – of Chinese troops occupying the base camp and spilling out into the surrounding countryside.  She wished, suddenly, that she’d spent more time studying the military, enough that she knew how to interpret what she was seeing.  How many troops were there really?  And what were they doing?  Do they intend to take the entire sphere?

It didn’t get any better as she was escorted into the cable car and taken back into space.  The Chinese were working fast, rolling supplies down the mountainside as well as moving men down the cables as quickly as possible.  There was something slapdash about their movements, although they seemed to be effective.  They’d turned the upper camp into a transit point with remarkable speed, even docking a troop transport on the edge of the funnel.  Charlotte had to give them points for thinking outside the box.  That hadn’t occurred to any of the planners, back when they’d thought they could explore the sphere at leisure.  But then, it wasn’t something anyone would countenance if there wasn’t a war on.

There will be, when word gets home, she thought.  If it ever did ... what was happening?  Did the Chinese think they could get away with it?  Did they think they could get control of enough alien tech to force the rest of the Great Powers to bend over and take it?  Charlotte knew there were plenty of dominant-minded people who would try to do just that, if they thought they could get away with it; she also knew that most people who rose to power tended to be very aware of the limits of that power.  What the hell are they thinking?

She kept the thought to herself as they marched her onto a shuttle and told her to sit.  There were no portholes, no way to watch the flight, but she suspected she was being flown out of the sphere.  There was nowhere else to go.  She wondered, grimly, if the rest of the MNF was still fighting, or if it had been overwhelmed and destroyed.  Her ignorance gnawed at her mind.  Everyone had thought the Chinese were their allies, that they’d cooperate to the best of their ability.  It wouldn’t have been that hard to put assault parties on allied ships, then take control when the time came.  The fleet was more vulnerable to a deceitful ally than an open enemy. 

The hatch opened.  A pair of Chinese soldiers helped her to her feet, searched her with surprising professionalism, confiscated her pistol and datapad, then escorted her through the hatch.  Charlotte wondered, nastily, if the Chinese diplomat was going to be in some trouble for allowing her to keep the pistol.  She might not be Stellar Star, Queen of the Spaceways, but she could have shot at least one or two people before being shot herself.  An oversight?  Deliberate malice?  She shrugged.  It probably didn’t matter.  She tried to keep her eyes open as she walked through the corridors, but she couldn’t tell anything of real importance.  She was on a starship – there was no mistaking the thrumming echoing through the hull – but which ship?  She didn’t know.

They stopped in front of another hatch, which hissed open to reveal a large chamber.  Her escort nudged her to enter.  Charlotte stepped inside, not bothering to conceal her interest.  A desk, a set of chairs, a large portrait of the current Chairman ... and, sitting behind the desk, Admiral He.  Charlotte tried not to scowl.  She’d enjoyed her chats with him, back when the MNF had been in transit.  The idea he’d turn on her ...

You grew up in High Society, she reminded herself.  You should know no one can be trusted not to turn on you.

Sure, her own thoughts answered.  I’m sure Thomas feels much the same way.

“Lady Charlotte,” Admiral He said.  The polite affability she recalled from their earlier meetings was gone.  “I’m afraid I must ask you to formally surrender.”

Charlotte blinked, then had to bite her lip to keep from giggling.  “Admiral...” – it was all she could do to keep her voice level – “I am by no means in command of anything, beyond myself.  Who and what do you expect me to surrender?”

Admiral He cocked his head.  “You are in the mission’s chain of command,” he pointed out.  “You have the authority to order a surrender.”

“So are you,” Charlotte countered.  She knew she shouldn’t bait him – she wasn’t dealing with someone who was absolutely restricted from laying a finger on her – but what else could she do?  “Why don’t you order a surrender?”

The Chinese officer’s lips twitched.  “It wouldn’t be obeyed.”

“Neither would I,” Charlotte said.  She was, technically, fifth or sixth in the chain of command.  Practically, she suspected that there’d be a hasty reorganisation if everyone above her met an unfortunate fate.  Not that it mattered much, not now.  They’d lost contact with Earth and the Chinese had turned on them.  “They know I’m a prisoner.  Even if they didn’t, they have scant respect for me.”

“Unfortunate,” Admiral He said.  “And if I ordered you to make the broadcast anyway?”

Charlotte tried not to show her fear.  Military personnel had training to teach them how to cope if they were taken prisoner, but she’d never had anything of the sort.  She had gone to boarding school, yet ... it wasn’t quite the same.  Six of the best, the worst punishment her teachers had ever been able to threaten, wasn’t remotely comparable to the torture the Chinese could deal out, from simply beating her to within an inch of her life to directly stimulating her brain’s pain centres.  Admiral He had nothing to lose by hurting her, not when he was effectively free of governmental oversight.  And would probably wind up taking the blame if contact was re-established before the Chinese position was unassailable.

The Chinese will pretend their admiral went rogue and we will pretend to believe them, she thought.  And so the current balance of power will remain undisturbed.

She cleared her throat.  “I dare say you could point a gun at me and I’d say or do whatever you want,” she said.  She’d done work with refugees from the security zone, when she’d been trying to build a reputation for being charitable, and they’d had some horror stories that had shocked her to the core.  People just didn’t do things like that.  They just didn’t!  “But no one will heed my orders, no matter what I say.”

“Perhaps,” Admiral He said, calmly.  “For the moment, you will be held prisoner onboard this ship.  As long as you behave, you will be treated well.”

“And if I misbehave, you’ll lock me in the brig and feed me bread and water?”  Charlotte found it hard to keep her anger out of her voice.  “Do you really think you’ll get away with this?  You just started a war with all four Great Powers!”

“Right now, we have no contact with Earth,” Admiral He said.  She’d already known that, but it still hurt to hear him say it.  “If contact is never re-established, we’ll build a new world here.”

“Really.”  Charlotte wasn’t impressed.  “And then ... what?  You’ll never see Earth again.”

She frowned, suddenly.  Years ago, she’d read a science-fantasy book about a man who discovered a treasure trove of advanced alien technology and used it to build his own civilisation, rather than hand it over to his government.  Did Admiral He have the same idea?  They had been making progress on unlocking the sphere’s secrets ... did he think he could turn it into his personal empire?  Or did the Chinese have something else up their sleeve?  A catapult?  It wasn’t impossible.  Catapults were expensive, but the Chinese could build a handful if they wished.  Or did they think they could turn the tramline back on ...

“We’ll see,” Admiral He said.  “Until then, behave yourself.”

“Sure,” Charlotte said, sarcastically.  The fact he hadn’t lashed out at her was worrying.  It suggested he felt secure.  Very secure.  “I’ll behave myself perfectly.”

Chapter Thirty-Four: HMS Endeavour, Dyson System (Interior)

The display was clear.

Staci kept her face under tight control as she studied it.  Endeavour was wrapped in a cloaking field, a safe distance from the hatch and the growing enemy presence, yet ... it was hard not to feel trapped.  She was used to the endless tracts of interplanetary space, with plenty of room to manoeuvre – or hide – as you worked your way back to the tramline.  Now, the only way out was through the hatch and the hatch was heavily guarded.  Staci doubted the screamer trick would work twice.  The Chinese were watching for it.

She took a long breath.  The rest of the flotilla was out there, somewhere, but they were maintaining complete silence.  She hoped they were out there.  The network of relay stations was effectively down, a number either taken out or simply shut down by the Chinese.  The flotilla might have been able to make a stand, if it had been able to coordinate, but that was no longer possible.  Anyone who risked using a radio signal was condemning themselves to certain death.  She had no idea if any of the other ships were still intact.  It didn’t matter.  For all the good they could do, they might as well be on the other side of the universe.

We expected some level of competition, she reflected.  Everyone would try to make sure they were the first to unlock alien secrets, then put them into mass production.  We expected as much.  But this ... we never expected outright war.  What the hell are they thinking?

Her terminal bleeped, drawing her attention to a report.  Endeavour was as ready as she’d ever be, for a conflict she didn’t dare fight.  Staci knew, all too well, what would happen if the Chinese got their battleships or starfighters into engagement range.  The survey ship wasn’t designed for intensive combat, certainly not against other modern ships.  She liked to think both sides would be crippled without their active sensors, inside the sphere, but ... what if she was wrong?  It might not matter, anyway.  The Chinese could afford to swamp her defences, expending enough missiles to crush her without using their active sensors.  She had no doubt they could make it work.

“Useless,” she muttered.  “We can hide, but we can’t fight.”

Her mood darkened.  She was a fighter.  She hated the idea of running from combat.  But her duty was to her ship and crew and ... she wished, suddenly, she’d been allowed to take command of a frigate, of a ship she could ride into the teeth of enemy fire.  If she’d known what was coming ... she shook her head, crossly.  No one had known.  The idea the Chinese would turn on them so savagely, in a manner that would certainly start a war when Earth found out, had been unthinkable.  She hated to consider the implications.  The Chinese had to destroy the entire fleet, just to cover their tracks.  There was no way they could ever risk Endeavour making it home.  She guessed they already had a cover story worked out.

They’ll probably blame it on the Builders, she mused.  She could just imagine how the story would go.  The silly bitch in command of Endeavour somehow triggered the fists to attack everyone, but luckily Admiral He was able to extract his ships ... he tried to get the others out, but they didn’t listen to orders from a Chinese officer ...

Her fists clenched.  It would be something like that.  And too many people would believe it.

The intercom bleeped.  “Captain,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “Can I join you?”

You don’t want me to report to you?  Staci rolled her eyes at the implications.  Most admirals expected their captains to call on them, not the other way around.  But right now, the admiral was about as useful as tits on a bull.  The MNF no longer existed.  The starships were either destroyed, surrendered or in hiding.  What can you possibly want to talk about?

“Yes,” she said.  She wished, again, that she had someone to talk to.  “I’m in my ready room.”

She keyed her terminal, ordering coffee, then pasted a calm expression onto her face.  The crew was being kept busy, partly to ensure they didn’t start brooding about their current situation, but no one was keeping her busy.  The departmental reports were no distraction from the grim awareness she was trapped, unable to escape without running a gauntlet that would destroy her.  Normally, she could sneak around the system and re-enter the tramline.  There was no way to do that now.

The hatch opened.  Admiral Dismukes stepped into the compartment.  He looked to have aged a decade overnight, his face tired and worn.  Staci felt a pang of sympathy.  The admiral was just a passenger now, unable to say or do anything to affect the situation.  And if they got home, he’d be in deep shit.  Staci had no idea how the Americans handled such matters, but she was fairly sure Admiral Dismukes would never be trusted with a command again.  It was unfair – no one, as far as she knew, had expected the Chinese to launch a sneak attack – but it didn’t matter.  Militaries were the same, all over the known universe.  If something went wrong, someone had to carry the blame.

“Admiral,” she said, trying to be respectful.  There was no point in rubbing his nose in his situation.  Besides, she had a nasty feeling they were in the same boat.  Probably the Titanic.  “Please.  Take a seat.”

Admiral Dismukes sat, saying nothing as the steward entered with a tray of coffee and biscuits.  Staci’s stomach growled as she saw them, a grim reminder she hadn’t eaten anything in hours.  It wasn’t as if Endeavour was short of food, but ... she took a biscuit and nibbled it, waiting for the admiral to speak.  The steward stepped out of the compartment, leaving them alone.  Staci suspected the admiral felt as alone and isolated as she did.  Half his staff, including Lady Charlotte, had been on the surface when the shit hit the fan.  Whatever had happened to them – and Staci feared the Chinese needed to make damn sure none of the POWs ever returned home – they were too far from the ship to be of any real use to anyone.

And we sent the Chinese a fucking download of everything we discovered, she thought, angrily.  Someone was going to use that to hang the admiral, and her, when they got back home.  Never mind the simple fact there had been no reason to suspect treachery, never mind the treaty obligations to share everything ... someone was going to play armchair admiral and insist the datapacket should never have been sent.  Give them time to go through it and they’ll know precisely where to find the command centres.

“The Chinese aren’t looking for us, I am told,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “Is that true??”

“It’s hard to say,” Staci said.  Years ago, someone had shown her a hologram of a starfield and told her the picture displayed one cloaked fleet looking for another, watched by a third.  She’d thought it a joke.  Now, it didn’t seem funny.  “They don’t dare use active sensors within the sphere.”

She sighed inwardly.  “But as long as they know we’re somewhere inside the sphere, they don’t have to worry about us getting home,” she added, her eyes slipping to the display.  “We can’t even make contact with the rest of the fleet.”

“Lady Charlotte said the Chinese were being suspiciously cooperative about the scavenger affair,” Admiral Dismukes said, sourly.  “I guess we should have wondered a little more about it.”

Staci shook her head.  “Water under the bridge,” she said, flatly.  There was no way they could roll back time and undo their mistakes.  Life was not a computer game, with save and reset options for unwary players  “We have to deal with the universe as it is.  We can engage in recriminations later.”

“Much later,” the admiral said.  They shared a dry smile.  There would be more than enough recriminations when they got home.  “Can we punch our way through the hatch?”

“No,” Staci said, flatly.  She’d spent hours working the simulations, trying to find a way to make it work, but even with all the advantages in her favour – a degree of optimism that was incredibly ludicrous – they still lost.  “They have one battleship within the sphere, another parked outside the hatch and a carrier doing ... something.  We’d be flying a predictable flight path that would take us within point-blank range of at least one of the battleships, which would get us torn to pieces before we could get out of firing range and escape.  And the starfighters could still run us down even if we do escape the battleship.”

Her mouth tightened.  “And if we did make it, where would we go?”

Admiral Dismukes nodded, coldly.  The outer tramline was gone too.  Endeavour could hide easily, if she made it to Dyson One or simply flew into interstellar space, but then ... what?  There was no way to get any further, unless the tramline came back online; no way to get back to Earth or even the nearest human colony.  And what if ... she didn’t want to think about it, didn’t even want to consider the possibility, but what if more tramlines had vanished?  No one was entirely sure why they existed in the first place.  What if they were all gone?

She swallowed, hard.  It would be the end.  Of everything.

“If we set out for the nearest star, it would take us at least fifteen years to get there at sublight speeds,” she said.  She knew that was optimistic.  Endeavour was designed for long-duration missions, but fifteen years would be pushing their luck a little too far.  The drive nodes certainly weren’t designed for fifteen years of continuous operation without maintenance.  “We ... we don’t even know there is a tramline there.  The one we used to reach this system was extended, somehow.  If we are lucky, if we do find a way back to Earth from the nearest star, we’ll still get there fifteen years too late.  Who knows what’ll have happened, between now and then?”

“Too much,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “It all depends on them figuring out how to use the tramlines, doesn’t it?”

Staci nodded.  The Chinese were caught in a bind.  If they were as isolated from the homeworld as the rest of the MNF, their only hope of survival was to set up a colony ... for which they’d need the help of the POWs and everyone else, certainly if they meant to maintain a working tech base.  If they did manage to reopen contact, the POWs would have to be murdered to uphold whatever cover story the Chinese thought the rest of the world would buy.  But giving the POWs a degree of freedom to buy their help would make it harder to murder them all if contact was re-established ...

They can probably work out a way to do it, given time, she thought, sourly.  They wouldn’t even have to murder the POWs.  All they’d have to do is drop the poor bastards somewhere on the sphere, somewhere far from any contact with Earth.

She met the admiral’s eyes.  “We can hide for some time,” she said, “but not forever.  Once the Chinese figure out pseudogravity sensors, they can find us.”

Admiral Dismukes scowled.  “How long?”

“They know the theory, everything we worked out,” Staci said.  “They’ll just have to produce the hardware.  That won’t take long.  Weeks, at best.”

And that is probably optimistic too, her thoughts added.  Endeavour had a pretty good machine shop, perhaps the best in the MNF, but it would be foolish to assume the Chinese didn’t.  If she’d been making contingency plans for being cut off from the rest of the human race she would have made sure to bring an industrial ship along too.  They might be churning out the hardware already.

“So we have to gamble,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “What if we try to reactivate the tramlines?”

Staci blinked.  “That would mean taking the ship back to the lone world,” she reminded him.  The research crew stationed on the planetoid should have gone silent, in hopes of escaping the Chinese, but there was no way to know if they were following orders.  Hell, there was no way to be certain they’d even got the orders.  The communications network had been very fragile even before the Chinese had started tearing it to bits.  “We might be discovered and run down.”

“Yes,” the admiral agreed.  “But isn’t that going to happen already?”

Yes, Staci thought.

She kept her face under tight control.  The admiral was right.  Normally, Endeavour could hope to remain hidden for months, if not years, but pseudogravity sensors changed everything.  The Chinese would start looking and eventually they’d get lucky ... or, just as bad, ensure she was kept away from anything interesting.  She doubted Admiral He would sit on his thumbs and hope for the best, rather than searching openly for the cloaked ship.  He couldn’t risk reopening the tramlines until Endeavour was hunted down and destroyed.

Her thoughts churned.  Her fighting soul wanted to take the gamble, to try and find a way to reopen the tramlines and escape ... or find another, more offensive, use for alien tech.  She’d done it once.  She could do it again.  Couldn’t she?  And yet, she knew her duty was to her ship and crew.  Risking them on a gamble that might easily pay off, or get them killed, was dangerous beyond belief.  She had no qualms about taking chances with a small ship and a crew of volunteers, but Endeavour wasn’t a warship ...

You have no choice, her thoughts pointed out.  There was no other way out of the system – or to remain hidden, when the Chinese started looking in earnest.  You have to act now or risk losing everything.

“You’re right,” she said, finally.  If they could reactivate the tramlines, they could get out of the sphere and back home.  The Chinese would be fucked, caught committing open hostilities – in a most treacherous manner – without the alien tech they needed to force the Great Powers to back down.  “If we can make it work again, we can escape.”

She sighed inwardly.  There was no time to offload non-essential personnel – and nowhere to put them, either.  Ideally, she would have sent a smaller ship – an expendable ship – but she didn’t have one.  There was no way to reopen contact with the remainder of the flotilla and no way to be sure the other ships were still intact.  For all she knew, they’d tried to run the blockade and died under Chinese guns.

“We have the tools,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “And the experts.”

“Not experts,” Staci corrected, grimly.  The researchers were proud of themselves, from what they’d written in their reports, but the smarter ones had pointed out they still understood very little of the alien tech.  They were children, randomly striking keys on an adult’s keyboard without any clear idea of what the keys did.  “We think we know some things about the alien tech, but we actually know very little.”

It was ... unbelievable.  She knew there were limits to how far one could fool-proof one’s systems – and she knew some fools could be very clever indeed, thinking outside a box they didn’t realise was there – but ... what sort of idiot would rig up a tramline generator that could be turned off at the drop of a hat?  Or ... perhaps she was overthinking it.  The Builders might have thought it was simple to turn the system on again, if it was turned off in error.  Endeavour’s weapons needed to be authorised to fire, but putting the safeties back on was easy.

She looked down at her hands.  “I’ll issue the orders,” she said.  There’d be no difficulty getting there normally, but now everything had changed.  “It’ll take us a couple of days to get back to the lone world.  I don’t want to risk generating turbulence.”

The admiral looked irritated.  Staci understood.  Time was not on their side.  As long as they didn’t pass too close to a sensor platform, they’d be relatively safe even if they pushed their drives to the limit.  But she didn’t want to take chances.  If the Chinese got a solid lock on her hull, or even a vague idea of where she was, they could hunt her down before she could break contact and escape.

“Do it,” the admiral said.  He looked as if he wanted to say something more, from a desire to command the away team himself to a request to sit on the bridge when the ship neared the lone world.  He made a visible effort to control himself.  “I don’t see any other choice.”

“Nor do I,” Staci agreed.

Her mind raced.  She wasn’t keen on fiddling with more alien technology, particularly after what had happened last time, but the admiral was right.  They didn’t have any better ideas.  If they could get out of the sphere ... it was better than nothing.  The Chinese would be unable to catch them and, if the Chinese reactivated the tramline, Endeavour would be able to escape too.  It was a gamble, but ... oddly, she felt better now the decision had been made.  She didn’t want to spend the rest of her life skulking in the dark.

Not that it would be a very long life, she reflected.  Once they get their new sensors up and running, we’ll be hunted down and destroyed.

She keyed her intercom.  “Mr. Jenner, prepare the ship for silent running.  We’re going back to the lone world.”

“Aye, Captain.”

Chapter Thirty-Five: HMS Endeavour/The Lone Planetoid, Dyson System (Interior)

“Who was it,” Tobias asked, “who said I have this déjà vu feeling all over again?”

Marigold grinned.  “You, just now.”

Tobias rolled his eyes at her, then returned to drying himself off.  He honestly wasn’t sure where he’d heard it.  Probably on one of the cartoons he’d watched on the dark web, television shows, movies and radio plays that had long since been banned for being subversive or irritating or simply too far out of date.  It had given him a little thrill to watch something the government had banned, although he had no idea why some of the material had been objectionable.  Perhaps it had just been banned and the government had forgotten why ... or that it had been banned at all.  He’d been taught at school the government was competent and had the best interests of the population at heart, but years in the military had taught him that the government wasn’t anything like as competent as it wanted people to think.  It functioned, and that was about the best that could be said.

He sighed inwardly, all too aware he was wool-gathering.  They’d received the orders a day ago, while the ship had been on its voyage to the lone world, and had spent most of the time since then in bed together.  What else could they do?  The shuttles had been checked, loaded and checked again ... he knew he should be running sims or resting or doing something productive, but it seemed pointless.  They knew their mission, they knew what they had to do to complete it and ... he shook his head.  There was no point in worrying about something far outside his control.  They were at war.  Again.

Marigold stepped past him, into the cramped shower.  Tobias watched her nude back for a long moment, drinking in the sight, then finished drying and dressing himself.  The ship was nearing the lone world now, drawing as close to the fists as they dared ... Tobias had watched the recordings of just what had happened to the Chinese cruiser, when a fist had struck it amidships.  Endeavour’s armour was flimsy in comparison, not that it would matter.  A battleship would be just as dead if a fist smashed into her hull.  The sheer power of the alien weapons was terrifying.

If we make it back home, he told himself, we need to get the fuck out of the navy.

He sighed again, then headed through the hatch and down to the shuttle.  The airlock opened on his command, revealing the craft’s interior.  It felt dead and cold, oddly spooky despite the standby lights blinking on the display ... for a moment, he felt as if he’d stepped into a nightmare, into one of his dreams where his craft had lost all power and found itself drifting into interplanetary space with no hope of rescue.  The feeling held him still for a long, chilling moment, before he gathered himself and keyed the activation switch.  The cockpit came to life in front of him, warnings blinking up to caution him against using active sensors.  He’d wondered why they hadn’t been locked out completely, but ... they might be needed at some later point.  Radios worked fine inside the planetoid, after all.

The Builders are fucking with us, he thought, darkly.  There was no real consistency to their decisions, no key he could figure out to unlock their mysteries.  He recalled one of his tutors teaching him how to play chess, and challenging Tobias to figure out the handicap, but ... there had been times he’d wondered if the old man hadn’t been playing fair.  He’d certainly not always revealed the secret, after the game.  Do they really believe their pets could climb into orbit and get to the lone world?

The hatch opened.  Tobias glanced back, hoping to see Marigold, but Colin stepped through instead.  The Royal Marines had been told to rest, but Colin didn’t look as if he’d slept at all.  Tobias wondered if he’d lain awake all night, or found himself a partner, or simply discovered his rest hadn’t been very restful at all.  He didn’t want to know.  Not really.  He wasn’t even sure Colin wanted to go home.  Did he have someone special, back in their hometown?  Or ...

Colin yawned.  “Are we ready to fly?”

“More or less,” Tobias said.  He hadn’t expected anything to change – the shuttle had been checked, rechecked, and then sealed – but he’d run through a final set of checks anyway, just to be sure.  Marigold would do her own when she arrived.  Once, he would have found that annoying.  Now, he knew it might make the difference between saving their lives and dooming them to a slow and agonising death.  “You?”

“Just waiting for the rest of the band,” Colin said.  “Don’t take your eyes off Professor Mansion.  He has wandering hands.”

Tobias eyed him.  Colin had had a reputation for wandering hands too, although he’d never crossed the line that would have led rapidly and inevitably to Borstal.  He wasn’t sure that was true.  He’d believed it, years ago, but now he had to concede Colin was a better person than he’d thought.  But then, the bar hadn’t been set very high. 

“He keeps touching alien tech,” Colin explained.  “If he wasn’t so good at understanding it, I would have left him on the ship.”

The hatch opened again.  Marigold and a cluster of scientists joined them, the latter looking deeply worried.  They hadn’t signed up to fly into a warzone and none of them had expected to be shot at, certainly not by allied ships.  Tobias guessed they hadn’t watched the endless remakes of Indiana Jones, in which the hero was shot at by everyone ... or, more likely, the movies had been about as realistic as Barry the Bully Hunter.  He’d certainly discovered, the hard way, that The Nelson Touch had been written and produced by someone who’d never served in the navy.  God!  The writer had even gotten the uniforms wrong.  Why didn’t they just look it up?

“We’re ready,” Colin said.  He’d played steward and made sure everyone was strapped into their seats.  It wouldn’t provide any real protection, if the fists targeted them, but at least it would keep them in place.  “You can fire when ready, Gridley.”

Tobias glanced at Marigold, who nodded.  “All systems go,” she said.  “Stealth units are up and running.”

“Keep an eye on it,” Tobias warned.  He wasn’t too worried about sneaking between the pseudogravity beams, but if they crossed a beam they’d have bare seconds to spoof it before the fists smashed them into a cloud of atoms.  “And be ready to deploy passive decoys.”

He scowled as he disconnected the shuttle from the mothership.  Active decoys might buy them a few seconds, if they drew the fists onto them instead of the shuttle, but no one was sure if the passive decoys would be worth the time the flight deck crew had spent loading them into the launch racks.  The decoys were meant to look like stealthed ships trying to sneak away, like a man who’d been caught with another man’s wife, yet so little was known about the alien sensors it was hard to tell if they’d even notice the decoys.  But using active sensors would tip off the Chinese ...

Assuming they’re close enough to notice, he thought.  The briefing officer had been quite honest about all the unknowns, orbiting the mission planning like vultures waiting for their target to die of thirst.  But they’ll be coming here soon enough anyway.  They need to reactivate the tramlines, too.

The air felt cold as the shuttle fell towards the dark world.  He’d read the reports that suggested the planetoid was more than just an artificial structure, perhaps even a starship in its own right, but it was difficult to wrap his head around it.  The sphere was a megastructure on a far larger scale, true, yet it was a shell wrapped around a star.  The planetoid starship, if that really was what it was, would be a far greater project.  Tobias had read accounts from the shipyard workers that had constructed Ark Royal, the most famous starship of the modern era, and Ark Royal had been an ant compared to a planetoid.  The construction program for a ship the size of a planetoid had to be several orders of magnitude greater ...

“We’re nearing a beam’s projected location,” Marigold said.  “Be careful.”

Tobias nodded.  There was no way to know the beam was there, short of actually crossing it, but ... he altered course slightly, giving the projected beam a wide berth.  Better to have the shuttle’s flight path become incredibly erratic than risk crossing the beam and drawing enemy fire.  His hands were sweaty as he steered the shuttle onwards, palms itching with tension.  If only they knew for sure!  The boffins had upgraded their computer models, after the last set had proven worse than useless, but Tobias found it hard to trust them.  None of the pilots had any faith in them.

“We’re nearing the gravity well,” he said.  There was no atmosphere to impede the shuttle’s flight, something that still bothered him.  It was unnatural.  Even Earth’s moon had a tiny wisp of an atmosphere.  The plan to repressurise the interior had run aground on simple logistics and enemy action.  “Get ready.”

He braced himself as the perspective shifted again, the lone world becoming a ball that rapidly flattened out as the shuttle descended to the surface and landed neatly near the hatch.  The research crew had put a makeshift airlock over the entrance – Tobias wasn’t sure why they’d bothered, when it would just lull visitors into a false sense of security – and hadn’t had time to remove it ... he wondered, grimly, why they hadn’t removed it in hopes of delaying the Chinese when they landed.  Not that it would have slowed them down for long – they knew where to find the entrance – but it might’ve bought the researchers a few more moments.  And a few moments could be decisive.

The shuttle hum died away.  “Good luck,” he said, softly.  “Don’t push anything you shouldn’t.”

“I won’t,” Colin said.  “But we’ll need to start experimenting soon.”

Tobias nodded as the researchers and marines donned their helmets and headed for the hatch.  It wasn’t going to be an easy job, even without the Chinese breathing down their necks.  He’d thought the boffins could figure out the alien tech through logic, but the gulf between Earth and the Builders was so wide it was impossible to even guess at what humanity didn’t know.  The scientists of two hundred years ago might have had no trouble figuring out what his shuttle was – it looked like a spacecraft – but unlocking how it worked would’ve taken a great deal longer.  Gravity fields, reactionless drives ... they’d been the stuff of science-fantasy.  The boffins of yesteryear might not have even believed what they saw, if they ever worked it out at all.

Marigold tapped her console. “Laser link online,” she said.  “Linking to the ship now.”

“Good,” Tobias said.  “If we can unlock the secrets ...”

“We might not have to,” Marigold said.  “Could you repair the shuttle, or build a new one from scratch?”

Tobias shook his head.  He knew quite a bit of theory – he’d studied some in school and some more when he’d joined the navy – but turning it into practice was beyond him.  It might be beyond even a person who knew everything, without the right tools and materials to put the shuttle together piece by piece.  The days in which a pilot could also be a mechanic and fix his aircraft with a belt of tools were long gone.  He wasn’t sure the pilots who’d fought the first Battle of Britain could have done it.  The pilots who’d fought in the First Falklands War certainly couldn’t have.

“Yep,” Marigold agreed.  “But you can still fly the shuttle.  You don’t need to know how she works to know what she can do, or how to make her do it.  They don’t have to work out how the alien tech produces tramlines.  They just have to work out how to make the tech do it.”

“You make it sound easy,” Tobias said.

Marigold smiled.  “My old headmaster was fond of telling war stories.  The terrorists he fought couldn’t have produced any tech of their own, but that didn’t stop them from learning how to use the tech themselves.”

“Hah.”  Tobias’s old headmaster had been a Walt.  He’d bragged of his military service and yet, when Tobias had spent a few hours poking through the public files, he hadn’t been able to find any trace of the Beast’s heroics.  The man should have had a file, even if anything beyond his name and service dates were classified.  It was funny, in hindsight, but there’d been plenty of clues all along.  The Beast had made military service sound like a war movie, not reality.  “I guess we’ll find out.”

“Yep.”  Marigold winked at him.  “I guess we will.”

***

“The team is on the surface,” Jenner reported.  The XO sounded tired, though he’d been ordered to take a nap hours earlier.  “The laser link is up and running.  Flight data is being transferred to the analysts now.”

Staci nodded.  The return to the lone world had somehow managed to be both boring and terrifying.  She’d risked using pseudogravity sensors as well as passive sensors and found nothing, but she wasn’t reassured. The boffins insisted they could tune pseudogravity fields to protect Endeavour from pseudogravity sensors and Staci couldn’t think of a reason the Chinese would be unable to do the same.  As technology advanced, the technology to fool it advanced too.  Given time, the Chinese would be able to catch up and overtake the remnants of the MNF.

And we can’t even get a message to them, she thought.  She’d tried to come up with a way of communicating with the other ships, perhaps using an expendable drone to send a message, but the Chinese had all the encryption codes.  They’d been careful not to bring anything specific to a single country ... in hindsight, that had been a serious oversight.  She’d spent some time trying to figure out a way to send a message that might get past the Chinese, without coming up with anything.  The admiral hadn’t been able to devise anything either.  Why didn’t we consider the possibility of treachery on such a scale?

She sighed, inwardly.  She knew the answer to that.

“Captain,” Commander Steven Willis said.  “There’s been an interesting development.”

Staci glanced at him.  The Alpha Black liaison hadn’t been allowed to leave the ship.  It might have saved his life.  She’d been assured the liaison officer had been conditioned to prevent him spilling secrets, even if he was interrogated under torture, but in her experience such assurances weren’t always worth the paper they were written on.  The Chinese would have been delighted to get their hands on him.

“We were experimenting with modified pseudogravity beams of our own,” Willis said, “and we might have had a breakthrough.  Two, really.  We might be able to deflect a fist if it comes at us, perhaps even destroy it.”

“Really,” Staci said.  She couldn’t keep the scepticism out of her voice.  She’d seen a fist smash a cruiser to atoms.  She felt like the little girl who’d been assured she could catch a ball hurled by an older student ... a ball that had broken her nose.  “You really think we can deflect it?”

“It’s possible,” Willis said.  “The pseudogravity beams interact and, in doing so, produce a thrust that shoves the fist in the required direction.  A little like a controlled reaction drive ... my guess is that, absent any countermeasures, the fist will keep flying along the flight path until it hits the sphere’s shell.  If there were fists inside Dyson One, they might just have flown into interstellar space and vanished.”

Staci frowned.  “And they might have shattered the sphere in the first place.”

“It’s possible,” Willis agreed.  “Our simulations agree it might have shattered the sphere, although we may never know for sure.  The impact, whatever it was, took place so long ago, and so many pieces of debris have since struck other pieces, that we probably can’t plot the debris trajectories back to a single point of origin.  As to why ... we know one of the control centres lets the locals control the hatch.  Another might let them control the fists themselves.”

“With their whole world at stake,” Staci muttered.  She’d made plenty of high-stakes decisions herself, but never with untold billions of lives at stake.  “I’m starting to think we won’t like the Builders, if we ever meet them.”

“They may be too advanced to care about such matters,” Willis said.  “Do we care about ants when they get in our way?  There was an old story about Earth being demolished to make way for a hyperspace bypass and the aliens didn’t care about us, didn’t even realise we had no way to complain.  Or they may believe the locals have to save or damn themselves.  We may never know.”

“No,” Staci agreed.  It was a fascinating mystery, but hardly important when her ship was trapped and her nation was at war ... a war it didn’t yet know it was fighting.  She cared more about the practical aspects of every new discovery.  “Can you make a deflector work?”

“We are working on it now,” Willis said.  “We may also be able to steer the fists ourselves, if we set up two projectors.  It might actually fool the automated defences into thinking the fists – our fists – are following orders from their superiors, rather than ...”

“Captain,” Helen Yang snapped.

Staci looked up.  Helen wouldn’t have interrupted unless it was urgent.  “Report!”

“Long-range passive sensors just picked up an incoming ship,” Helen reported.  “She’s Chinese!”

Chapter Thirty-Six: The Lone Planetoid, Dyson System (Interior)

“The data is clear,” the researcher said.  “The lone planet is the key to the sphere.”

Admiral He nodded, curtly.  Two days of careful probing had revealed no trace of the remaining enemy starships.  They had to be somewhere within the sphere, but they were so tiny – on such a scale – that as long as they were careful, they could remain hidden indefinitely.  He’d considered a number of schemes to lure them out of hiding, yet none of them seemed promising enough to take the risk of trying.  The best he could do was keep the hatch blockaded and ensure none of the missing ships could break out into interstellar space.

But they can’t stay hidden forever, he thought, grimly.  The Chinese had secured the research station, the supply transports and the industrial vessels.  It was hard to calculate how long the missing ships could remain hidden before vital components started to break down, but even the most pessimistic estimates were less than a year.  Perhaps much less, depending on just which components failed.  The longer they wait, the worse their chances become.

He studied the interior display for a long, cold moment.  The tactical problem was unique – in a sense.  The Chinese held the location the foreigners needed to take – and quickly.  It wasn’t quite the same as needing to dislodge an enemy who held the high ground, but the steps they’d need to take were comparable.  They’d have to risk soaking up heavy casualties if they wanted to break through and even coordinating the offensive would be difficult, if not impossible.  Could they coordinate?  There had been no reference to contingency plans for Chinese treachery in any of the captured databases, but that didn’t mean plans didn’t exist or that preparations hadn’t been made.  China had certainly entered the grand alliance on the understanding it might come to an end at any time, that China might be sold out for the good of everyone else.  The British and Americans would be naive if they hadn’t at least considered the possibility of selling out or being sold out themselves. 

Time favours me, he reflected.  But for how long?

He looked up, at the researcher.  The man hadn’t been assigned to the exploration fleet or the base camp.  He was catching up, studying the captured databases and interrogating the prisoners.  There were gaps in his knowledge and he had no hands-on experience, not like the teams who’d explored the alien structures.  But it couldn’t be helped.  There had been no way to slip him into the team before the fighting had broken out.

“Can you be sure?”

“They were experimenting with the lone world’s systems when the tramlines ... went off,” the researcher said.  “Their own files indicate they pushed the wrong button and ...”

Admiral He tried not to glare at the display – or the researcher.  What sort of idiot touched a piece of alien technology without knowing what it did?  They knew alien tech often didn’t look anything like its human counterparts.  Sure, the laws of science were the same the universe over – he didn’t place any credence in the suggestion the laws changed from place to place – and alien tech might be built to do the same thing as human tech, but that didn’t mean the devices were identical.  The Tadpoles built tanks that looked like giant crabs and guns that looked like mining tools, devices that had confused the humans who’d first laid eyes on them.  Hell, even a difference as minor as measuring units could cause all sorts of confusion.

“You’ll go directly to the lone world,” he ordered.  Detaching a couple of ships from the fleet was risky, but it wouldn’t give the enemy a chance to get through the hatch.  “I want the command centre in our hands, then studied to determine how to turn the tramlines back on.”

“Yes, Admiral.”

Admiral He looked at the security officer.  “Deploy troops to secure the centre and take all enemy personnel into custody, alive if possible,” he added.  “Do not damage any of the alien technology.”

“Yes, Admiral.”

We’ll see, Admiral He thought.  If you fuck this up ...

He scowled.  Security troops, even the ones trained to secure asteroids and space habitats, weren’t supposed to be gentle.  Rioters had to be put down as quickly as possible or the suggestion that the state was losing its grip would start to spread, a suggestion that might become reality if the rioting spread out of control.  The government knew what would happen if the people thought they had a chance to lash out at their tormentors, at a state that insisted on imposing itself into every aspect of their lives.  Admiral He had no illusions.  The only thing keeping the government in power was a massive security apparatus, preventing the population from organising, and a willingness to do everything from quietly disappearing anyone who asked the wrong questions to crushing riots with extreme force.  No one really cared if a city district got banged up, as long as the government remained in control.  But here ...

His mood darkened.  There was no way to repair the alien tech, if it got damaged in the crossfire, and no way to convince the foreigners to work with him if they were treated too brutally.  If they made contact with China again, it wouldn’t matter, but if he had to set up a permanent colony with himself as warlord, he needed the foreigners.  He wished, not for the first time, that he’d been allowed to take some of the better security troopers with him – the ones who knew to keep the iron fist wrapped in the velvet glove – but the government had flatly refused.  Those units were in short supply ... and, if anyone noticed they were gone, it would raise questions the government didn’t want to answer.

We have the advantage of time and position, he told himself.  The ships and personnel who’d been outside the sphere had been rounded up or destroyed.  The prisoners would be held in the research station for the moment, while the remnants of their ships were broken down for spare parts or simply directed into the star.  Given time, the planned cover story could be put in place.  All we have to do is move to take control of the interior and then ...

He smiled, coldly.  It might be to his advantage not to restore the tramlines too quickly.  If he could delay matters without making it obvious, without alerting the covert watchdogs he knew the government had inserted into his command staff ... the possibilities were endless, if he played his cards well.  Who knew what would happen then?

Wait and see, he told himself.  If we cannot restore the tramlines, we may be trapped here for a very long time.

***

“Confirmed, Captain,” Helen said.  “I’m reading two ships now, one definitely a destroyer.  The other ... I think she’s a troop transport, but I can’t be sure at this distance.”

“Passive sensors don’t make it any easier,” Staci agreed.  The Chinese ships were closing rapidly.  Endeavour might be able to take them – she certainly had the firepower – but that would alert the remainder of the enemy fleet to her location.  The timing sucked.  There’d be no opportunity to get the landing party off the planetoid, nor even pull back the shuttles before the Chinese got into position to catch them.  “Do they know we’re here?”

“I don’t believe so,” Helen said.  “They haven’t altered course to intercept or scan us.”

Staci nodded, curtly.  The Chinese wouldn’t risk active sensors.  There were a hundred fists orbiting the lone world and they’d all seen a single fist obliterate a heavy cruiser.  If she were in command of the Chinese ships, she’d have every active emitter locked down and the entire crew cautioned to keep their mouths firmly shut.  The latter might seem pointless, but it would encourage the right attitude.  One moment of carelessness could be enough to get the entire ship vaporised, along with her crew.

Her mind raced.  She could ambush them.  Under normal circumstances, she could pull off a point-blank ambush and blow the destroyer away before she knew she was under attack.  But Endeavour wasn’t a front-line warship, and she wasn’t designed to mount a sneak attack, no matter how good her cloaking device was.  And there was the other Chinese ship ... if she carried weapons, or had the time to alter course to ram, the battle could easily end badly.

And if the fists detect us, it could really end badly, she mused.  We can’t risk a fight and we can’t risk doing nothing either.

“Communications, signal the landing party,” she ordered.  “Tell them to go to ground.”

“Aye, Captain,” MacPhee said.

Staci made a face.  The shuttles were probably doomed.  There was no time to get them into space, not before the Chinese got into position to shoot them down.  But the crews could get into the planetoid and hide, along with the research team and their escorts.  The mapping team had barely scratched the surface, by their own account, and the Chinese didn’t have access to what few maps there were.  They’d have time to hide, perhaps time to turn the tables on the invaders and ambush them ... time, perhaps, to let Staci come up with a way to get them back to the mothership.  She promised herself, if she ever got back to Earth, she’d ask for a transfer to the infected zone.  She’d have fewer civilians to look after there.

But there’ll be a war as soon as we get home, she thought, morbidly.  The Chinese might come up with a cover story that the rest of the world would pretend to swallow, but she doubted it.  This was no minor skirmish, no argument over who’d gotten to a new star system first, no accidental exchange of fire in a disputed zone ... the Chinese had deployed an entire battle fleet to ambush the MNF.  There was no way in hell anyone would accept it was an accident.  The war against the Chinese would likely leave us defenceless against the next alien threat.

She put the thought aside and leaned forward.  “Helm, pull us back,” she ordered.  “Use the pseudogravity field to conceal us near the fists.”

“Aye, Captain.”

Staci could sense the sudden flicker of fear running through the bridge.  She had a brave and experienced crew, but they’d seen the fate of the Chinese cruiser too.  The fists could smash Endeavour to atoms and never even notice ... hell, it might happen by accident.  If the boffins were right, Endeavour could hide amongst the fists and remain unnoticed; if they were wrong, they’d be dead before they knew it.  She knew she had no choice.  The Chinese wouldn’t look for them there.  Even if they did, the pseudogravity fields surrounding the fists would keep the survey ship hidden.

We think, Staci told herself, as the ship started to sink closer to the planet.  If we’re wrong ...

She shook her head.  The only other option was backing off and abandoning the lone world to the Chinese.  If they discovered how to restore the tramlines – or something worse – they might just get away with it.  The boffins had speculated the Builders had used intense gravity fields to open wormholes capable of swallowing entire planets, then smaller fields to tear those planets apart to provide raw materials for the sphere.  If the Chinese learnt how to do that, they’d do more than just get away with their treachery.  They’d become the masters of the known universe.

“Captain,” Helen said.  “The Chinese ships are decelerating.  They’ll be stationary, relative to the planetoid, in five minutes.”

“Keep an eye on them,” Staci ordered.  There was nothing she could do to stop them.  She doubted she could get another screamer into place, not quickly enough to matter.  “Inform me when they start launching shuttles.”

Jenner caught her eye.  “Captain, they might try to land the ship.”

Staci blinked.  The troop transport wasn’t anything like as big as a capital ship, but she was far larger than anything humanity could land safely on a planet.  The largest thing humanity had lowered to a planetary surface were colony pods and those were unmanned.  The transports would normally launch shuttles or dock at an orbital station.  But the lone world had low gravity and no atmosphere, and it might just be possible to land the transport ... barely.  Getting her back into space would be a second challenge, yet ... they might decide it was better to convert the transport into a forward base than set up facilities on the surface.  Who knew what might be waiting in the tunnels for unwary explorers?

Let’s hope they didn’t think of that, she thought.  She wasn’t sure she would take the risk, unless she was desperate.  The fists were more than capable of taking out the entire transport if they got a sniff of her presence.  It was cold-blooded to say the shuttles were expendable, along with their crews and passengers, but it was true.  The Chinese could afford to write the shuttles off.  The transport was irreplaceable.  We’ll find it impossible to sneak a shuttle back down if they do set up a base on the surface.

She watched the display, cursing the timing under her breath.  She hadn’t expected the Chinese to move so quickly, not if they hadn’t worked out where she was going and moved to block her.  Had they?  Or had they figured out there was little on the sphere’s surface to draw their attention?  Staci had no idea what had happened to the base camp, now the Chinese had landed in force, but she was fairly certain the Chinese would know – quickly – what the landing parties had discovered.  And they might be reluctant to risk poking the alien command centre.  It would be the height of irony if they accidentally closed the hatch and trapped themselves.  Again.

Not that it matters, she thought.  Unless we misunderstand the systems, they can simply open the hatch again.

“Captain,” Jenner said.  “The shuttle crews are evacuating now.”

Staci nodded.  “Keep me informed,” she said.  “And tell them we’ll put together a rescue operation as soon as possible.”

She meant it, she reflected sourly.  There was no way she would willingly leave someone behind, not if there was any way to avoid it.  But now ... unless she came up with something  new, they might have no choice but to leave the away team to its fate.

***

Tobias cursed out loud as he pulled his helmet over his head and locked it into place, then grabbed the emergency bag and threw it over his shoulder.  He hadn’t really expected to be allowed to remain in the shuttle, not when they’d have to return to the mothership to pick up more supplies and personnel, but ... he hadn’t thought he’d have to run into the planetoid either.  He checked Marigold’s suit, then waited for her to check his before he overrode the safety precautions and opened both airlocks.  The shuttle’s atmosphere rushed out of the craft.  The Chinese would see it, of course, but it didn’t matter.  They’d have spotted the shuttles on the ground already, unless they were blind.  They didn’t need active sensors to locate the craft.

And they wouldn’t be coming here if they couldn’t see us, he told himself.  Sweat prickled on his back, fear washing down his spine.  He was no groundpounder.  He knew how to use a pistol and that was about it.  He might be fitter than he’d ever been, thanks to a combination of naval food and training, but Colin still outmatched him and he was sure the Chinese soldiers outmatched him too.  What’ll they do if they capture us?

He shuddered.  There was no clear idea of what had happened to the people trapped on the sphere, but he doubted it would be pleasant.  Legally, the Chinese had to take care of their POWs.  Practically, they might simply hand the prisoners over to the natives or dispose of them themselves.  Tobias wasn’t an expert on international relations, but he knew bullies and the Chinese government was very definitely comprised of bullies.  They’d probably kill the POWs and swear blind it had been a horrid accident, rather than deliberate malice.  And they’d probably get away with it.

Marigold tapped his shoulder, then pointed to the display.  Tobias nodded – exaggerating the movement to keep his helmet from hiding it – and watched as she keyed the purge code into the device, then added his own when she’d finished.  A low quiver ran through the shuttle as the craft powered down, then purged its tiny datacores.  The Chinese would have to replace them if they wanted to put the shuttles to work.  Tobias had no doubt they could do it – the human race had worked hard to ensure most components were standardised, allowing the Chinese to plug one of their own datacores into the shuttle – but it would take them time and deny them access to the shuttle’s records.  They’d have no idea how many foreigners were hiding within the planetoid, ready to ambush them.  Or even remain out of sight long enough for the mothership to mount a rescue mission.

He stepped outside, into the eerie half-light, and looked up.  There was no sign of the incoming shuttles – or the fists, swarming above the planetoid like angry piranhas – but he knew they were there.  His imagination insisted the shuttles were doomed, that the fists would smash them out of existence, but he knew better.  The Chinese wouldn’t have risked launching their shuttles unless they were sure they could sneak through the fists and land on the surface.  They were probably right.

Marigold joined him and pointed to the entrance.  Tobias nodded and started to walk.

He didn’t look back.

Chapter Thirty-Seven: The Lone Planetoid, Dyson System (Interior)

Colin was facing, in his own estimation, a tactical nightmare.

There was, as far as he knew, only one way in or out of the lone planet.  The gravity and pseudogravity scans hadn’t revealed any second entrance and he had the nasty feeling, if one existed, it must be on the other side of the planetoid.  It might as well be on the other side of the sphere.  The planetoid was only small compared to an actual planet or the sphere itself.  By human standards, it was staggeringly – impossibly – huge and walking across it would take months, if it was even possible.  He felt as if he was trying to defend an underground bunker from an invading force, with barely a handful of men.  The best he could do was make the Chinese pay a price for their invasion.

He studied his HUD as the timer ticked down to zero.  The Chinese knew where to find the entrance, unless they assumed the data download had been carefully altered before it had been forwarded to their ships.  Colin doubted it would take long to verify something as simple as the entrance’s location, if only because the shuttles were parked right next to it.  Unless the Chinese thought they were decoys ... no.  That was absurd.  Probably.  It didn’t matter anyway.  If the Chinese were paranoid enough to check everything from scratch, they’d still find the entrance and start exploring very quickly.  He dared not assume they’d take longer than ten minutes and that was optimistic. 

His eyes lingered on the holographic map.  They’d deployed automated mapping drones as soon as they’d worked out that radio signals were safe inside the planetoid, although they still kept transmissions to a minimum.  The interior they knew was growing rapidly – a maze of corridors, broken up by compartments that served no understandable purpose – but it was still only a tiny fraction of the whole.  He assumed the Chinese knew where to find the first control centre too, although they’d have to get through the babble zone to get there.  He’d already deployed two men to prep the area for an ambush.  The babble zone would provide one hell of a distraction.

“Get everyone down into the command centre and beyond,” he ordered.  The researchers had to continue their work, even if it meant putting their lives at risk.  The shuttle crews could look after them ... he hoped.  “We’ll hold the line here.”

But not for long, he thought, as the handful of men – barely even a platoon – started laying booby-traps near the entrance.  We’ll have to hurt them once, then fall back to stage another ambush further down the corridor.

His heart beat like a drum.  There was very little cover, very few places they could hide a mine or explosive pack.  Compared to the buildings he’d probed carefully – very carefully – as a young recruit, there was almost no concealment at all.  The only upside was that the walls – bulkheads – were almost indestructible, but even that wasn’t an advantage.  Bullets weren’t going to go through the walls, or lodge themselves in the material, but bounce off the metal and fly down the corridor.  He dreaded to think what would happen, when the Chinese started hurling grenades to clear the way.  The walls could contain and direct the blast towards him and his men.  If the Chinese had enough grenades, they could try something that normally only worked in computer games that had about as much resemblance to real life as his old headmaster’s war stories.  He wondered, idly, if they’d think outside the box and try it.

Harris caught his eye.  “We’re ready, sir.”

Colin nodded, although he didn’t feel ready.  He knew exactly what his old instructors would say, if they saw his makeshift defences and booby-traps.  They’d call him an incompetent fool who’d learnt his tactics from movies written for civilians.  If he’d done it during an exercise, he’d be lucky if he wasn’t dishonourably dismissed on the spot.  But there’d been no choice.  If he’d had a few days of warning, enough time to strip supplies from the shuttles and the mothership, he could have made things much harder for the Chinese ...

Stop wishing for things you don’t have, he told himself.  Be glad you have what you have.

He tensed as the first Chinese troopers came into view, wearing light combat suits.  A good choice, he supposed, although a pair of heavy suits would have been much more useful in clearing the way.  They moved oddly, falling into a pattern that was both practiced and yet unsure, as if they were green troops facing combat for the first time.  Colin had expected something a little more aggressive ... but then, the planetoid was alien territory and the Chinese had time to probe carefully.  There was such a thing as being too aggressive.  Colin had learnt that the hard way ...

His finger found the detonation key and rested on top, waiting as the last seconds ticked away.  It wasn’t clear if the Chinese would spot the first set of traps – even experienced troops often forgot to look up – but if they did ... he pushed the key, the moment the Chinese got into position, and felt a hot flash of satisfaction as the explosions blasted the Chinese back in disarray.  Pieces of makeshift shrapnel lashed from above, striking the armoured figures or hitting the floor and flying back up.  He wasn't sure if they would slice into the enemy armour, but it didn’t matter.  They’d know they’d been kissed.

He darted forward, hurled a pair of grenades, then turned and fled.  Explosions blasted out behind him, the remaining marines firing a handful of shots before fleeing themselves.  The Chinese staggered, their follow-up units pushing past the wounded to give chase.  Colin smirked as his team rounded a corner, prepping the next set of booby-traps as they ran.  The Chinese ran right into the explosive packs and triggered them, the explosions hurling them back.  Colin glanced over his shoulder and saw a Chinese trooper fall to the ground, blood leaking from his chest.  He felt a stab of sympathy, despite everything.  He had no qualms about killing terrorists, and infected zombies had died the moment the virus overwhelmed them, but the Chinese troops were just like him, young men obeying orders from their elders.  The Chinese wouldn’t have conscripted their front-line troops, any more than the Royal Marines used conscripts.  They’d volunteered to serve their country ...

Keep moving, he told himself.  A bullet cracked past him and vanished somewhere down the corridor.  If they catch you, you’re dead.

***

Marigold cowered.

Tobias raised his fist and struck her, hard.  She stumbled backwards, falling to her knees.  Her eyes pleaded for mercy, mercy he didn’t choose to grant.  His manhood stood proud as he raised his fist and hit her again, and again, and again.  Her screams meant nothing compared to the sheer power of beating her into a pulp, of hurting her so far past the point of sanity that ...

The world shifted.  Marigold was in front of him, wearing her suit.  Tobias staggered.  She’d been naked and now she was in her suit and ... he thought he saw two realities, one overlaying the other.  It was hard to tell which one was real ... he tasted bile in his mouth as he realised they’d been caught in the babble zone.  Colin’s report had stated the zone made your nightmares feel real, but ... he was suddenly uncomfortably aware his manhood was as hard as a rock.  What did it say about him, he wondered, that his nightmare had been beating his girlfriend into submission ... no, worse than that.  He’d been beating her for the sick joy of it.

Fuck, he thought, numbly.

Marigold glanced at him.  It was hard to see her face, under the helmet, but her eyes looked shocked.  What had she seen?  Had they shared a reality?  Or ... had she seen herself putting him down, indulging in the sheer pleasure of crushing his heart because he couldn’t fight back, like the girls he’d known at school.  They’d been brave, but only when there was no real danger ... he bit his lip hard, using the pain to focus his mind.  The babble zone hadn’t just destroyed his hard-won maturity, such as it was.  It had sent his mindset all the way back to school.

The marine caught his attention and pointed down the alien corridor.  Tobias managed a jaunty salute, then stumbled onwards.  The alien control system lit up around him, strange lights and icons that seemed almost comprehensible ... almost.  He had the weird feeling it would make sense, if he stared at it long enough to figure out the key.  But he didn’t have time.  The Chinese were coming, advancing towards the command centre.  The pistol on his belt mocked him.  There was little hope of doing more than irritating the Chinese when they arrived, if he shot at them.  His suit felt fragile.  He was uneasily aware a single puncture would be enough to doom him.

Marigold wrapped her hand into his.  Tobias tried not to flinch.  The memories hadn’t been real – he knew it – but they felt real.  Even a VR environment wasn’t so ... complete in every detail.  It was worse than that ... he shuddered, trying not to throw up in disgust at how much he’d wanted the fake reality.  It had been a power fantasy, no different from imagining himself a super-strong alpha male, yet ... it had clearly felt real.  He knew it hadn’t been, and yet it was.  His head spun, trying to make sense of it.  What would have happened if he’d stayed in the babble zone for too long?  Would the fake reality have overwhelmed the real world?

He wasn’t sure he wanted to know.

It felt like hours before the corridor widened suddenly, revealing another alien command centre.  Tobias stared at it, feeling oddly small.  He’d once read an article insisting that there were limits to how big intelligent creatures could grow, but ... the Builders might have been the same size as dinosaurs.  If the chamber in front of him was normal, for them ... they had to be at least twice the size of the average human.  Or maybe the chamber wasn’t meant to have a gravity field.  A zero-g space habitat would look very weird if someone installed a gravity field and turned it on.

“I think it’s another test,” a suited man said.  His nametag read MANSION.  “They’re trying to make us prove we can handle their tech.”

Tobias frowned, studying the lights.  The pattern reminded him of something ... but what?  It nagged at his mind, haunting him.  He felt as if he were looking at a tiny piece of something greater, yet if he could figure out what he was seeing the rest of the puzzle would fall into place ...

It clicked, suddenly.  “The lights are the fists,” he said.  The perspective was odd.  The display didn’t show the planetoid itself.  Perhaps the operator was meant to hover in the middle of the compartment and manipulate the fists with his hands ... he’d seen a movie where the hero had done just that, although in the real world, holographic tech wasn’t quite up to the task.  “If you get up there, you can control them.”

Another researcher stared at him.  “How can you be sure?”

“Because we’re looking at them from the wrong perspective,” Tobias said.  “It’s like trying to fly a shuttle from the outside, rather than being on it ... like trying to drive a car backwards.  The perspective is all screwed up.  But if you’re inside the car and it’s going in the right direction, you can control it without so many problems.”

“And you don’t forget where you are either,” Marigold added.  “You wouldn’t steer a fist into yourself.”

Mansion studied the display for a moment, then nodded.  “How do you get up, then?”

Tobias hesitated.  “Is it a good idea to try?”

“Maybe not,” Mansion said.  “But if we don’t get control soon, the Chinese will catch up and take the complex for themselves.”

***

Colin gritted his teeth as he stepped through the babble zone.  Again.

It felt less ... unpleasant this time, more like a bad memory than something dragged out of his subconscious and given a certain kind of reality.  He wasn’t sure if that meant he was getting used to it or if the babble zone had decided he was allowed to enter without putting up more than token resistance.  There was no way to be sure, although he suspected the former.  The men who’d found themselves trapped in their own nightmares, unable to force their legs to carry them through the zone, had taken it much harder the second time around.  He had a nasty feeling that someone with a weak heart probably wouldn’t survive long enough to get into the complex.

“Take your positions,” he muttered, once the team was on the far side of the zone.  “Get ready to engage.”

He took a breath, taking a moment to centre himself.  The Chinese had pushed them back slowly, each skirmish buying the researchers a few additional minutes to explore the planetoid.  Colin wasn’t expecting much, even as the HUD updated with more corridors and compartments.  There was something weird about the interior ... he snorted in cold amusement.  They were inside an artificial planetoid inside a shell wrapped around a star ... and he thought the interior was weird?  It was probably something to do with the fact they’d barely explored even a tiny percentage of the interior.  It would make more sense once they’d explored the whole.  Or maybe they’d just encounter a few more mysteries and get their minds blown, again.

A thrill ran through him as the Chinese appeared on the far side of the chamber, weapons sweeping the air as they spread out.  He couldn’t see their faces, but he could tell they were scanning for threats.  The booby traps had grown less effective, as the Chinese had adapted their tactics, yet they’d still scored some kills.  Colin hoped the Chinese would continue being careful, even when he ran out of material to make booby traps.  They were already scraping the bottom.

A shame we didn’t think to bring more, he thought.  If they’d had time, they could have transported enough men and materiel – and even a makeshift tank or two – to turn the planetoid into an impregnable fortress.  But we had hard limits on our supplies ...

He tensed, counting down the seconds as the Chinese advanced into the chamber.  They knew the babble zone was there, if they’d read the first reports, but they didn’t know precisely when they’d cross the threshold.  It didn’t seem to be consistent, which meant the reports were accidentally misleading.  And besides ... Colin found it hard to believe the Chinese would have sent their troops into action without a proper briefing, but no words could convey the reality – hah – of the babble zone.  It was the difference between reading an outline of commando training and actually going through the course.  No matter how much they thought they were prepared, they were wrong.

The advance faltered.  Colin couldn’t see any faces, but he knew they were screaming in agony at their own private hells.  Fingers tightened on triggers, terrified soldiers firing randomly ... Colin ducked, cursing himself for the oversight.  He hadn’t been primed to expect attack, when he’d first crossed the line.  The Chinese ... he winced as bullets sprayed over his head, striking the far walls and ricocheting back.  They might do more damage to his team by accident rather than design.

“Fire,” he ordered, quietly.

He took aim and opened fire, squeezing off shot after shot.  They didn’t dare waste ammunition, not when they had no idea when they’d be resupplied.  The Chinese behind the lead party returned fire, cutting down their own people as they tried to find their British enemies.  Colin almost felt sorry for the poor bastards in the middle.  The babble zone had trapped them and then they’d been gunned down by their own side.  One lunatic was firing so madly, before he was picked off, that he was more dangerous to his comrades than anyone else.

The gunfire died away, abruptly.  Colin allowed himself a moment of relief, although he knew it wouldn’t last.  The Chinese would come at them again, or find a way to outflank them, or ... he motioned for his men to stay behind as he inched forward, into the babble zone, to take the enemy weapons before their reinforcements arrived.  One man had lost his helmet, his face exposed to the vacuum.  If he hadn’t lost the back of his head, Colin would have thought he’d died of sheer terror.  His face was twisted into a rictus.

Poor bastard, he thought.

He looked up as he sensed more invaders approaching, then scampered back to his lines to wait for them to cross the babble line.  They’d see the bodies and be careful ... probably.  He almost wished he’d had time to booby trap the bodies, although it would have been a war crime.  The Chinese had broken the rules ... he shook his head.  There was no time to do more than leave the bodies in place and hope they deterred the Chinese from pushing too hard.  Their supplies were running low, even with the captured enemy weapons.  It was just a matter of time until their ammunition ran out.

And it is too late to surrender, he thought, coldly.  The moment they realise we can’t fight them any longer, we’re dead. 

Chapter Thirty-Eight: The Lone Planetoid, Dyson System (Interior)

Captain Li felt his mood darken with every passing moment.

It had seemed an easy mission, when the admiral had given the orders.  Escort the transport to the lone world, land troops, secure the planetoid and take possession of the alien technology for China.  The first part of the mission had gone very well, despite the British arriving ahead of them, but the second part was turning into an unmitigated disaster.  The British had landed a small army on the surface and they were using the tunnels to draw his troops into ambushes that were draining his strength without accomplishing anything worthwhile.  Admiral He was a smarter and more experienced officer than most, Captain Li knew, but he wouldn’t hesitate to turn a subordinate into a scapegoat if the operation really did become a disaster.  And it was starting to look as though that was exactly what was going to happen.

He stalked his bridge, staring at the display with cold fury.  The alien planetoid was just too big – he refused to believe it was a space station, let alone a starship – and the British had landed enough troops to prolong the fighting for weeks.  They had to have a ship of their own somewhere nearby – the shuttles didn’t have the range to reach the lone world from the north mountain – but where was she?  And what was she doing?  Why wasn’t she attacking?  Li would have gone on the offensive, particularly if he had the advantage of surprise.  Doing nothing meant ceding eventual defeat. 

“Captain,” the communications officer said.  “The admiral is requesting a progress update.”

Li scowled.  The communications officer should have been back home, getting married and having babies, rather than playing at being an officer on his bridge.  If it was up to him, she’d have been sent home at once, but she was the niece of a powerful official and dismissing her for anything less than outright treason would just get him in trouble.  He almost hoped they never made contact with Earth again, just for the pleasure of finally putting the spoilt little brat in her place.  She wasn’t completely incompetent, but she was taking a job that needed a man.

He took a moment to calm his thoughts.  “Inform the admiral that we are making progress,” he said.  It was true, just vague.  “We hope to have the alien megastructure in our hands shortly.”

The girl turned back to her console.  Li glowered at her back.  The admiral was feeling antsy, unsurprisingly.  If the researchers were right, the planetoid was the key to the system and had to be taken, even if it meant trading a hundred lives for one.  And someone on the destroyer or the transport had probably also provided the admiral with a more accurate outline of just what had happened in the last few hours.  If he dispatched reinforcements and they arrived before the enemy were defeated, the new CO would take the credit.  It was unthinkable.

“Captain,” the sensor officer said.  He was older than the rest of the bridge crew, but owing to some indiscretion would never rise any higher.  “My fake gravity sweeps have picked up something interesting.”

“Oh, really?”  Li turned his attention to the older man.  It was almost a shame.  Whatever he’d been caught saying couldn’t have been that bad or he’d have been dispatched to the labour camps for re-education, rather than simply being condemned to remain a junior officer for the rest of his life.  Even Li could see the injustice of it all.  “And what have you found?”

“The fists produce gravity shadows,” the sensor operator said.  “Our fake gravity fields don’t.”

Li gave him a sharp look.  He’d been briefed on the latest theories of how the alien tech worked, but he was no expert.  He had subordinates to handle the specifics.  “So?”

“There’s a gravity field that doesn’t seem to have a gravity shadow, Captain,” the sensor officer said.  He keyed a console, lighting up an icon on the display.  “I think it’s a cloaked ship.”

“Hiding near the fists,” Li said.  It was insane, but ... he had to admit it was a pretty good tactic if someone wanted to remain undetected.  The fists generated enough distortion to make the cloaked ship impossible to spot with passive sensors, while bringing up active sensors was suicide. “Clever ...”

His mind raced.  The largest ship known to be at liberty was a survey ship, but she wasn’t designed for close-range combat.  He could take her – or, at least, inflict enough damage to ensure she couldn’t hide again.  If it was the survey ship ... the briefing notes had made it clear the only machine shop remaining in enemy hands was onboard her.  Once it was gone, the operational effectiveness of the remaining rogues would fade rapidly.  British and American repair crews were allowed more freedom than their Chinese counterparts, and knew much more about how their tech actually worked, but there were limits.  One couldn’t make a silk purse from a sow’s ear if one didn’t have a sow’s ear!

He looked at the communications officer.  “Update the admiral,” he ordered.  She could do that, at least.  “We are moving to intercept.”

“Aye, Captain.”

***

Stellar Star, Staci had reflected more than once over the past few hours, led from the front, firing two blasters at the enemy even as her clothes threatened to fall off.  Stellar Star existed only in the imagination of her writers, who didn’t know anything about how the military worked and made their tactics up out of whole cloth.  It might be more dramatic for the captain to lead the away team in person, but it made better sense to send a subordinate who was actually trained to do the job.  And yet ... she scowled.  She’d lost contact with the landing party and that meant she had no idea what was going on within the planetoid.  The Chinese could have won by now or they could have been wiped out to the last man.  She simply didn’t know.

“Captain,” Helen said.  “The enemy destroyer is bringing up her drives.”

Staci frowned, feeling a flicker of alarm.  The enemy ship needed to stay close to the transport or risk having her blown away by Endeavour’s missiles – or screamers.  Staci’s machine shop was already rigging up additional screamers, ready to try to insert them into position to draw the fists onto the enemy ships.  And yet, if the destroyer was powering up her drives ... Staci didn’t like the implications.  What was she doing?

We don’t know the ship, she thought, numbly.  It was hard to be sure – no one used IFFs within the sphere – but the ships the Chinese had assigned to the MNF hadn’t been openly involved in the brief engagement.  She wasn’t sure if that was a good sign – the Chinese might have doubted their reliability – but it didn’t matter.  She didn’t know the enemy commander and she couldn’t guess at his thinking.  We have to prepare for the worst.

She leaned back in her chair.  “Helm, prepare to move us further into orbit,” she ordered, calmly.  If the Chinese wanted to play cat and mouse, she could dare them to follow her into the fists.  “Tactical, prepare to deploy two screamers to point the fists at the enemy ship, but do not launch without my direct order.”

“Aye, Captain.”

Staci nodded, her eyes on the display. She didn’t dare move too quickly.  The Chinese would be watching for any hint of her presence and they were far too close to the fists for comfort.  The boffins insisted the pseudogravity field would keep them safe, if they touched a pseudogravity beam, but Staci didn’t want to test the theory.  They were just too close to the fists.  One miscalculation and they’d be dead.  Besides, she could be wrong.  The Chinese could be planning to send the destroyer back to the hatch. 

Or they could be trying to distract us while they sneak up in our rear, she thought, coldly.  It was the sort of tactic that wouldn’t work anywhere else, even without pseudogravity sensors, but it might work here.  Endeavour was trapped in a weirdly confined space.  Or we might have misunderstood our passive sensor readings.

Her console bleeped.  “Captain,” Willis said.  “The pseudogravity beam generator is ready to be tested.”

Staci snorted.  “Prepare for activation, but do not go live,” she ordered.  “Keep the system powered down until I say otherwise.”

“Aye, Captain,” Willis said.  It sounded as if he hadn’t been paying attention to what was happening outside the hull.  Staci didn’t really blame him.  There was nothing he could do about it.  “We should be able to give them a shove.”

“Calculate firing trajectories too,” Staci added.  “But again, do not power up the system.”

“Aye, Captain.”

“Captain,” Helen said.  The display updated, the red icon starting to move.  “The Chinese ship is heading towards us, on attack vector.”

Staci felt cold.  They found us, she thought.  It should have been impossible, but the Chinese ship heading straight for them could not be a coincidence.  How the hell did they track us?

Her mind raced.  Had the Chinese taken the alien command post below and used it to locate Endeavour?  Or was it something else ... a flicker of energy, something so minor it would have been missed anywhere else, that had drawn the enemy to them.  She cursed under her breath as she contemplated the possibilities, trying to work out which one was the most likely.  It was impossible to do more than guess, if alien tech was involved.  For all she knew, the Builders thought her cloaking device a toy – or a joke.  To them, maybe she was the little girl covering her eyes and pretending she couldn’t be seen.  It didn’t matter.  She had to take care of her ship first and worry about the rest later.

“Helm, move us deeper into the field,” she ordered.  The Chinese ship would catch them if they tried to make a break for open space, insofar as it meant anything within the sphere.  A running battle might be a tactical win, but a strategic defeat.  “Let’s see if they dare follow us.”

And if they do, we’ll need to take one hell of a risk, she thought.  They cannot be allowed to run us down.

***

“Captain,” the sensor officer said.  “The enemy ship is moving into low orbit.”

Li smiled in gleeful anticipation.  A ship that could stand and fight would have stood her ground.  A ship that could have outrun him would have fled for open space.  But the enemy vessel was trying to hide ... the survey ship.  It had to be the survey ship.  And she was at his mercy.

He glanced at the communications officer.  “Has there been any word from the admiral?”

She stiffened, noticeably.  “No, sir,” she said.  It was clear she wanted to say quite a bit more.  “There’s been no response.”

Of course not, Li thought.  It would be nearly thirty minutes before the admiral received their update and thirty minutes after that before any reply could reach them, assuming the admiral responded at once.  The admiral probably wouldn’t.  Admiral He was experienced enough to know a few minutes either way wouldn’t make much of a difference, not when the shit was already hitting the fan.  But if you try to explain it to me ... 

“Tactical, deploy an active sensor drone and two passives,” he ordered.  “Program the active drone to pulse low orbit, but do not bring the scanners online until the drone is well clear of us.”

“Aye, Captain.”

Li leaned back in his chair, watching as the probe shot away from his ship.  Probes rarely went active, even in systems monitored by purely human tech.  It would almost certainly get them killed – here, it definitely would.  It wouldn’t matter.  The probe would last long enough to light up the planetoid, giving him a hard lock on the survey ship.  And then he could close the range and finish her off.

“The probe is going active now,” the tactical officer reported.  “Sir ...”

The display updated rapidly, first displaying the planetoid itself – eerily perfect, little more than a ball of metal that just happened to be immensely huge – and then the fist, barrelling out of orbit with all the unstable brutality of a punch in the face.  Li watched, expressionlessly, as the fist struck the probe and vaporised it, then swung around and glided back to orbit.  He couldn’t help thinking there was something eerie about the way it moved too, as if it didn’t quite obey the laws of physics.  But then, everyone knew the laws of physics weren’t as ironclad as they seemed.  The ship he commanded would have been a pipe dream two hundred years ago and no doubt she would seem laughably primitive to the spacers of two hundred years in the future.

“Captain,” the tactical officer said.  “We have a solid lock on the enemy ship.”

“Helm, move to overwatch position,” Li ordered.  As long as the survey ship was pinned against the planetoid, she was trapped.  Worse, perhaps.  If she tried using her weapons, there was a very good chance the fists would kill her before she could move.  “Communications, laser her.  Demand her surrender.”

“Aye, Captain.”

Li studied the display as the seconds ticked away.  The enemy ship couldn’t do anything but surrender.  Unless she wanted to die ... it would be wasteful, to say the least, but he didn’t care.  The admiral might want the survey ship and her crew intact – if nothing else, they might need the genetic stock – but Li wasn’t going to risk his ship to do it.  It would cost him his career.

“No response, sir,” the communications officer said.

“Repeat the signal,” Li ordered.  “And make damn sure you hit their hull.”

“Aye, Captain,” the communications officer said.  The irritation in her voice was growing louder.  “Signal sent.”

***

“They have us,” Helen said.  “Their active sensor pulses pinned us down.”

“They’re lasing us,” MacPhee added.  “They’re demanding our surrender – or else.”

Staci nodded, curtly.  She might have made a mistake flying too close to the planetoid, although there’d been few other choices.  The Chinese skipper had been smart to use a drone to sweep the orbitals, allowing him to locate Endeavour and plot a course to her.  They’d still have to worry about crossing pseudogravity beams, but the fact they’d managed to get shuttles to the surface suggested they knew how to spoof the alien sensors.  The bastards had copied her technique, damn them.  And they were about to run her ship down.

She keyed her console.  “Mr Willis, tie your beamers into the tactical network,” she ordered, shortly.  “Prepare to engage.”

“Aye, Captain,” Willis said.  “I’m a very good billiards player.”

Staci smiled, grimly.  “Fire at will.”

She braced herself.  If the boffins were wrong, or the Builders reacted badly ...

“Triggering now,” Willis said.  “Beam engaged.”

A fist shuddered, then spun out of orbit.  It wasn’t the smooth and deadly flight she’d watched, a projectile fired right across the system to hit something light minutes away, but it worked.  The fist seemed to be staggering, as if the pilot was drunk, but it was heading in the right direction.  Staci smiled, coldly.  The Chinese would have to react quickly ...

***

“Captain,” the tactical officer snapped.  “Incoming!”

“Evasive action,” Li ordered.  He had no idea what had provoked the attack, unless the alien sensors had picked up the laser beam, but it didn’t matter.  The fist wasn’t moving at the normal impossible speed – in fact, its flight path looked decidedly erratic – yet it didn’t matter.  He could fire every missile his ship carried at the fist and it wouldn’t even notice.  All he could do was get the hell out of the way.  “Hurry!”

The fist lanced at them and missed, flashing past the ship and racing into the unknown.  Li heard someone swear behind him, a breach of discipline that would normally bring severe consequences.  For once, he couldn’t make himself care.  He’d come very close to shitting himself.  Being in a space battle was one thing, but facing an invincible weapon designed by an alien superpower was quite another.

“Captain,” the tactical officer said.  “There’s another one charging us!”

“Back off,” Li snapped.  The fists were behaving oddly – it occurred to him, too late, that the British might have figured out how to control them – but it didn’t matter.  “Tactical, target the enemy ship and open fire!”

The fist seemed to jump forward.  For a moment, Li wondered if it had teleported ...

... And then it was too late.

***

“Captain,” Willis said.  “We got her.”

Staci nodded, feeling numb.  The fist had struck the Chinese ship and vaporised her.  There was no point in searching for survivors.  The Chinese hadn’t had time to evacuate and even if they had, the blast would have wiped out the lifepods.  It was hard to feel much of anything as the fist spun into the distance.  Space warfare had just changed, again.  And who knew what would happen next?

“Try to corral the fists, or point them into the star,” Staci ordered.  The rogue projectiles would strike the sphere otherwise, if the weapons platforms couldn’t kill them.  She didn’t want to find out the hard way.  “Communications, raise the Chinese transport.  Inform them they can surrender or meet the same fate.”

“Aye, Captain,” MacPhee said.

Staci allowed herself a moment of relief.  The Chinese would know what she’d done and, perhaps, seek terms.  At the very least, she’d have more time to work out how to take control of the rest of the structure and turn it against the Chinese.  If she could get the tramlines back ...

“Captain,” Helen said.  “Long-range sensors are picking up an incoming ship!”

She broke off, then looked up helplessly.  “She’s a battleship!”

Chapter Thirty-Nine: The Lone Planetoid, Dyson System (Interior)

“They took control of the fists?”

“No, sir, I don’t think so,” the sensor operator said.  “I think they used focused gravity beams to hurl them at our ships.”

Captain Ruan frowned.  Captain Li had been an idiot, a party loyalist who could be relied upon to do as he was told and not much else.  He’d had his uses – he had no qualms about carrying out orders to bomb civilian targets and slaughter refugees – but he’d been unlikely to ever be promoted to a rank where no one would be riding herd on him.  It was possible, of course, that Li hadn’t realised the fists were drawn to radio transmissions – even though the lesson had been driven home, repeatedly – by their admiral.  But it was also possible that Li had simply been outwitted.

He looked at the operator.  “How can you be sure?”

“The fists normally move in straight lines,” the operator said.  “This one – if the passive sensor telemetry is correct – wobbled, even as it struck the destroyer.  It wasn’t under alien control.”

“I see.” 

Captain Ruan stared at his display for a long moment.  The lone world was the priority.  If foreigners got control of the alien tech, even nothing more than hurling fists across the system, it would be the end.  The plan wouldn’t just fail.  It would fail spectacularly.  And yet, he was all too aware of precisely what would happen if the battleship was struck by a fist.  The ship was the most heavily armoured vessel in the navy, but her armour might as well be tissue paper.  He had to get to the lone world, and fast, yet ...

“Captain,” the operator said.  “I believe we can use focused gravity beams of our own to deflect the fists.”

Ruan frowned.  He was a brave man – he knew it to be true – and yet the fists scared him.  Their mere existence rendered his ship obsolete.  If the operator was wrong, the battleship would be effortlessly atomised and the mission would fail.  But staying clear of the lone world, or even taking the time to launch shuttles on ballistic trajectories, risked everything too.

“Do it,” he ordered.  “Helm, keep us on our current course.”

“Aye, sir.”

***

“Captain, the troop transport is breaking orbit,” Helen reported.  “She’s fleeing.”

Staci gritted her teeth.  The transport, in itself, wasn't a serious threat.  She’d already landed her shuttles and couldn’t dispatch more troops, unless her captain really did try to land on the planetoid.  Her instincts told her to fire on the transport, or launch a fist after it; common sense told her to let the ship go and concentrate on the incoming battleship.  If they forced the Chinese to surrender, the transport would surrender too.

“Let it go,” she ordered.  “Do we have word from the surface?”

“The Chinese troops are surrendering,” MacPhee reported.  “But that may not last.”

Staci nodded.  The Chinese and their captors might swap roles, if the Chinese destroyed Endeavour or chased her away from the planetoid.  The battleship would land more troops and recall the transport, burying her people under sheer weight of numbers.  In hindsight ... Staci shook her head.  They’d done everything right, based on what they’d known at the time.  They hadn’t expected treachery.

“Mr Willis, try and target the battleship with the fists,” she said.  She didn’t want to think about how many people she was condemning to death.  There was no choice.  “If you can take her out, do so.”

She scowled.  It was like playing billiards on a cosmic scale, except ... if she’d just watched a human-controlled fist vaporise a destroyer she’d have backed off to think again.  The battleship was still coming.  Staci didn’t like the implications.  It was possible the battleship captain was too scared of the consequences of disobeying orders to acknowledge that the orders were outdated, but ... it was also possible he had something up his sleeve.  What would she do, if she knew she had to land troops regardless of the cost?  She wouldn’t come barrelling in like an idiot.  She’d cloak and try to sneak up on the planetoid, try to get into firing range before she was noticed and blown away.

Except we can see through their cloaks now, she thought.  The Chinese analysts might not have put the pieces together, not yet, but she dared not count on it.  They might think a frontal assault is their only choice.

“Captain,” Willis said.  “The first fist is being deployed ... now.”

Staci nodded, feeling cold.  The fist was going to be flying around the interior for a good long time.  Willis might have aimed the alien weapon in hopes of steering it into the star, when it had completed its mission, but she wasn’t so sure.  She still didn’t know what would happen if – when – the fist charged the shell.  Would it be taken out?  Or would it unleash a holocaust that would kill uncounted billions of locals?  Or even punch right through the shell and out into interstellar space?

The shell is pretty much indestructible, she told herself.  The alien metal couldn’t be scratched by any destructive force known to man.  But that won’t stop it messing up the interior.

She shuddered.  What if the impact actually jolted the shell into motion?  What if the movement eventually brought the star into contact with the shell?

“Captain,” Willis said, sharply.  “The fist was deflected!”

Staci blinked.  On the display, the fist had altered course and was heading directly towards the star.  “What happened?”

“The Chinese used a gravity beam of their own to alter the fist’s flight path,” Willis reported, grimly.  “They were out of place to hurl the fist back at us, but they were able to prevent it from striking them.”

“Fuck,” Staci muttered. 

Her mind raced.  The fists could be deflected indefinitely, at least until the range closed to the point the Chinese had no time to react before it was too late.  She had to give the battleship CO props for nerve.  She wasn’t sure she would have done it, not if she’d known a mistake would cost her the entire ship.  Perhaps he’d still believed, deep inside, that his ship had enough armour and firepower to survive long enough to escape.  Or ... she shook her head.  It didn’t matter.  The situation had just taken a turn for the worse.  Again.

“Keep throwing fists at them,” she ordered.  It was possible she’d get lucky.  “And tactical, deploy stealthed screamers behind them.  Try to draw a real fist onto them.”

“Aye, Captain,” McDougall said.

Staci leaned forward.  How much did the Chinese know?  The stealthed screamers were – in theory – undetectable by passive sensors, but the Chinese might have rigged up their own pseudogravity sensors.  If they had, they might spot the screamers before they were moved into position and take them out with railguns.  It was what she would do.  God knew they’d take the threat seriously.  They’d watched her kill an expensive cruiser with a makeshift – and cheap – drone.  They wouldn’t let her do it again.

She forced herself to think.  If they didn’t get lucky, the battleship would get close enough to launch shuttles and take the surface.  It might also get a lucky shot at her.  She’d have to back off, which would mean ceding the planetoid to the Chinese ... and basically conceding total defeat.  The last report from the surface hadn’t suggested any breakthroughs, but ... it was just a matter of time before the Chinese turned up something useful.  They had to be stopped.

“Captain, they deflected the second fist,” Willis reported.  “I might be able to push the third a little faster if I overpower the generators.”

“Do it,” Staci ordered.  It might distract the Chinese long enough for the screamers to get into position.  “Don’t give them any time to think.”

“Aye, Captain.”

***

Colin hadn’t really expected to feel sorry for the Chinese.

The babble zone had done a number on the troops unlucky enough to walk into it, some of whom had been unable to get out before their minds were cast into endless torment.  Others, the ones who’d brought up the rear, had seemed determined to continue the fight until they’d received orders to surrender.  And still others had ignored the orders and vanished into side tunnels, sniping at the British troops from a safe distance.  Colin had the uneasy feeling his position was being eroded, even though the fighting had eased off.  The longer the Chinese ran through the tunnels, the greater the chance they’d stumble into one of the hideouts or find something useful within the planetoid.  He wanted to think they’d have enough sense not to touch anything that might be dangerous, at least without knowing what it did, but he knew better.  Professor Mansion had known the dangers and that hadn’t stopped him from accidentally turning off the fucking tramlines!

He cursed under his breath as he surveyed the prisoners.  They hadn’t made any real provision for POWs, and it showed.  They had no life support bubbles, so they had to leave the Chinese in their suits; they didn’t even have any ties to bind their hands behind their backs.  They’d collected everything that was obviously a weapon, a communicator or a terminal – the Chinese had had surprisingly few of the latter – but he dreaded to think what might still be within their suits.  He kept a pistol and a number of tools within his suit and the Chinese might have done the same.  He’d once met an SAS trooper who’d actually concealed a blade within his forearm.

“Sir, the good news is that they left the shuttles alone,” Harris reported.  “The bad news is that there’s a fucking huge Chinese battleship incoming.”

Colin scowled.  He had a very patchy impression of just what was happening in space, although the fact most of the Chinese had surrendered suggested Endeavour had come out ahead.  The Chinese would have kept fighting if they hadn’t thought they were thoroughly screwed, that there was no point in prolonging the battle ... he stared at the men, lying on the ground, and cursed under his breath.  They might be submissive now, but that would change if a new wave of Chinese troops arrived.  They’d have standing orders to escape, if they had a chance.  Hell, they might even produce concealed weapons and open fire the moment he turned his back.

He gritted his teeth.  The Chinese weren’t terrorists, insurgents, or others who’d put themselves outside legal protections.  Murdering the POWs would be ... well, murder.  He’d be charged, tried and shot, if he wasn’t handed over to the Chinese.  He had no idea how many of the old treaties would still be in effect, by the time the war ended, but it probably wouldn’t matter.  No one would risk allowing such a precedent to stand.  He’d be executed.  It didn’t matter by whom ...

“Get the prisoners further into the complex,” he ordered, finally.  It wasn’t the best solution, but there were no better options.  He’d have to hope there weren’t any concealed alien controls within the makeshift prison camp.  “And then set more booby traps by the entrance.”

“Yes, sir,” Harris said.  He didn’t point out they were desperately short of everything, even after confiscating enemy supplies, but Colin heard it anyway.  “I’ll get right on it.”

***

“Captain,” the operator said.  “The fists have been deflected.”

Captain Ruan allowed himself a tight smile.  The British were still throwing the indestructible alien weapons at his ship, but they couldn’t even begin to push the fists at a respective fraction of the speed of light.  His operators had more than enough time to detect, track and deflect the incoming projectiles.  It was nerve-wracking, but ... they were steadily nearing the planetoid.  His marines were already crammed into shuttles, ready to be launched to reinforce the troops on the ground.

“Captain,” the operator snapped.  “I’m picking up a probe approaching on a ballistic trajectory!”

Captain Ruan leaned forward.  The probe wasn’t aimed right at his ship.  Unless it altered course, it was going to pass behind them ... a flash of alarm ran through him as he realised what the probe was, what it had to be.  A screamer ... clever, part of his mind noted, but not clever enough.  The probe was following a perfectly predictable course, a course that couldn’t be altered without bringing up its drives and risking detection, a course that would ensure his gunners had no problem taking it out.

“Take it out,” he ordered.  The British were running out of tricks.  They had to be.  He’d land his troops, claim the planetoid, and then the British could surrender or die.  “Now.”

“Aye, Captain.”

***

“They took out the screamer,” McDougall reported.  “Captain?”

“Deploy two more,” Staci ordered, although she had little hope of success.  The Chinese clearly had read the reports she’d sent, before she’d realised she was about to be knifed in the back.  “Helm, prepare to move us out of orbit.”

Atkinson visibly hesitated.  “Aye, Captain.”

Staci schooled her face into a mask.  There were no other moves she could make, not now.  The Chinese would enter orbit themselves and blow Endeavour away, if the cruiser was still there when they arrived.  Or ... she tried to come up with something new, something clever, but drew a blank.  The best idea she’d had was faking the survey ship’s destruction and hoping that the Chinese would drop their guard, but she doubted it would work.  Endeavour wasn’t the only rogue ship trapped within the sphere.  It would be a very long time before the Chinese risked leaving the hatch uncovered.

“Helm, set course for the shades,” she ordered.  Guilt tore at her.  The Royal Navy did not leave people behind, but she had no choice.  There was no time to bring the landing parties back to the ship before the battleship arrived.  “Take us out.”

“Aye, Captain.”

***

The alien control system was ... bizarre.

Tobias felt as if he were floating within a sphere, watching lines and icons flickering in front of him.  The lights felt ... weird, as if they were more than just holograms.  The boffins had claimed the Builders could produce solid light holograms, a technology that existed only in bad science-fantasy, and Tobias was starting to suspect they were right.  He stared at the alien systems, trying to understand how they worked.  He was starting to think the Builders really hadn’t been humanoid.  The system seemed to want him to use three or four arms at the same time.  Perhaps the Builders had had four arms.

Or they worked as a team, he thought.  Two or three people could probably make the system work if they knew how to work together.

He felt himself lost in a haze of lights, pieces slowly falling into place.  The system was ... it struck him, suddenly, that the system was akin to using knives and forks.  One didn’t just use a knife or a fork, if one wanted the best results; one used both in unison.  His mind raced.  That might be why the tramlines had been deactivated, if the report from the first mission had been accurate.  Professor Mansion might have triggered the system, but without drawing out a destination for the tramline he’d accidentally turned it off instead ... the system both was and wasn’t a user interface.  The map in front of him, with himself in the centre, was the territory.  He had the tools to manipulate it at will.

“The Chinese are coming,” a voice said.  It sounded weak and tinny, as if the speaker was on the other side of the chamber.  “We have to be ready to move.”

Tobias nodded slowly, staring at the lights surrounding him.  The fists were easy to identify, even the ones spinning out of orbit ... seemingly at random.  The other lights were harder ... he thought, as he concentrated, that one of them had to be the battleship.  There were no IFF beacons, but ... the fists did seem to be being tossed at a single light.  And ...

He reached out, gingerly.  The alien tech moved with him.  It felt ... disconcerting, as if he’d plugged himself into a VR machine without quite separating himself from the real world.  He was and wasn’t the alien machine, reaching out across the universe ... it felt like a hand he hadn’t known he had, part of him moving in unison ...

... And he wrapped his hand around the light code and squeezed.

***

“Captain,” Helen snapped.  “I’m picking up two pseudogravity beams, converging on the battleship ... my god!”

Staci stared.  It was a monstrous behemoth, bristling with weapons and defences.  Now ... it was being crushed, as if a small black hole had materialised within its hull.  Gravity waves raced out in all directions, dull tremors rattling Endeavour’s hull as waves might rock a boat.  The battleship didn’t stand a chance.  The ship crumpled, then exploded as the gravity nexus faded away.  There were no survivors.

“Captain.”  Helen swallowed and started again.  “Captain, the pseudogravity beams came from the planetoid.”

“Raise the landing party,” Staci ordered.  It was hard to keep her voice steady.  She hadn’t seen such a one-sided curb-stomp battle, if battle wasn’t too dignified a word, in her entire career.  “Find out what happened!”

“Aye, Captain,” MacPhee said.

They must have figured out a way to activate the alien tech, Staci thought.  She didn’t think the Chinese had accidentally provoked an attack.  The battleship hadn’t emitted anything that might have drawn the fists to it, let alone anything worse.  If we can work out how to do it again ...

She smiled, coldly.  We might be able to put an end to this once and for all.

Chapter Forty: The Hatch, Dyson System

The report was unbelievable.

Admiral He stared at the telemetry from the probe in complete disbelief.  The probe had shadowed Captain Ruan, mainly to ensure there was an independent record of what happened when the battleship reached the planetoid, and ... the recording was completely and utterly absurd.  The battleship had crumpled in on itself, the hull breaking as if it were being crushed by invisible hands, then exploded.  There’d been a burst of high-order energies – he had no idea if the fusion cores had exploded or if they were a by-product of ... of whatever had shattered the battleship – and then ... and then there was nothing, save for an expanding debris sphere.  He didn’t want to believe what he saw.  It was incredible.

His mind raced.  The British had landed on the lone world.  Did they have control of the lone world, or the sphere?  Launching fists was quite bad enough – his ships had deflectors, but he feared they wouldn’t be enough – but actually controlling the sphere itself?  He didn’t want to think what they could do.  He had a battleship, a carrier, and two dozen smaller ships – a force that could have casually wiped out the fleets that had fought the First Interstellar War – and they might as well be children’s toys, compared to the raw power that had crushed a battleship.  There was no escape, either.  The tramlines were gone and he didn’t have the time to pull back to Dyson One.

The intercom bleeped.  “Admiral, this is Han in Tracking,” a voice said.  “We’re picking up a survey ship, leaving the planetoid and heading straight for the hatch.”

For us, Admiral He translated, mentally.  An hour ago, he would have greeted the news with complete satisfaction.  The survey ship wasn’t that tough.  His gunners could and would have torn her apart, if she refused to surrender.  But now ... she wouldn’t be coming at him like a bat out of hell, not even bothering to hide her presence, if she didn’t think she could get away with it.  What else have they found?

He keyed his terminal.  “Have Lady Charlotte brought to me at once.”

“Aye, Admiral.”

Admiral He frowned as he studied the display.  The British ship really wasn’t trying to hide.  It showed a degree of fearlessness ... no, a certainty she wouldn’t draw attention from the alien defences.  Had they figured out how to take control?  Admiral He couldn’t imagine any other reason to take the risk.  He keyed his terminal and found the nearest fist, holding position two light minutes from the hatch.  It could be on the carrier in six minutes, if it wanted her dead.  If the British had control ...

The hatch opened.  Lady Charlotte stepped into the compartment.  She looked tired and worn, but otherwise fine.  Admiral He had given her a cabin and left her alone.  “Admiral?”

“Your people appear to have gained some control over the alien tech,” Admiral He said, shortly.  He knew from their earlier chats Lady Charlotte was no spacer.  She wasn’t a trained diplomat either, although she did have a certain talent for diplomacy.  “What are they doing?”

Lady Charlotte smiled, although there was no humour in the expression.  “You had me locked in a prison cell for the last few weeks,” she said.  He wasn’t sure if she was exaggerating or if she’d truly lost track of time.  “Why do you think I know anything about what they’re doing?”

Admiral He opened his mouth, then paused as the intercom bleeped.  “Admiral, we’re picking up a laser signal, standard protocols,” the communications officer said.  “They’re trying to talk to us.”

“Put it through,” Admiral He ordered.

His terminal lit up.  Admiral Dismukes’ face appeared in front of him.  “This is Admiral Dismukes, Admiral Commanding Task Force Clarke,” he said.  “As you should have been able to determine, we have gained control of the alien weapons and used them to take out your battleship.  The rest of your ships have been targeted.  If you surrender, without further delay, we will treat your people as prisoners of war and return them to Earth as soon as possible.  If you refuse, your ships will be destroyed.  You have five minutes to reply.”

“Well,” Lady Charlotte said.  “Is he telling the truth?”

“They did kill a battleship, somehow,” Admiral He said, tartly. 

His mind raced.  Five minutes ... that wasn’t anything like long enough, not to decide the fate of his entire fleet.  His mind raced.  If the British did manage to restore the tramlines and return home, China would be in deep shit.  Gambling was one thing, but gambling and losing was quite another.  He’d be branded a rogue warlord and thrown to the wolves ... if the tramlines were restored.  If they weren’t, if the remains of the MNF had to set up a permanent colony on the sphere and keep studying the alien tech in hopes of finding a way home, there might be a chance to recover and resume his mission.  And besides, his people couldn’t be ignored.  The colony would need them as much as he’d needed the foreigners when he’d had the edge.

But ... were they bluffing?

It was impossible to tell.  The fists could atomise his fleet.  Or ...

“It seems to me that you’re screwed,” Lady Charlotte said.  “Is there anything to be gained by getting yourself killed for nothing?”

Admiral He conceded the point with a nod.  He was probably dead, whatever happened.  His enemies wouldn’t leave him in command of his ships, his minders would probably look for a chance to plunge a knife into his back, his government would execute him when he returned home to cover their tracks.  If he ever did ... he wanted to refuse and if it had been just his life at stake he would have, but there were thousands of his crew and soldiers under British guns.  His enemies had an obligation to invite him to surrender.  Beyond that, they had no obligation to hold back if he refused.

He scowled at the display.  Endeavour was still barrelling towards the hatch, showing no fear of human or alien weapons.  She was either very brave, very foolish ... or knew there was no real danger.  Admiral He didn’t have to check the tactical projections to know what would happen, if the fists engaged his fleet.  They’d wipe him out well before Endeavour came within weapons range.  The British would retake the hatch, secure the base camps below and then ... who knew?  He wouldn’t be around to see it.

“Very well,” he said.  “Let there be an end to it.”

He keyed his terminal.  “General signal, all ships.  There is to be no discussion about this.  You are ordered to surrender your ships and personnel and obey all further orders compatible with your obligations to the state.  You are to destroy your secure datacores, but otherwise make no attempt to render your ships non-functional.  That is all.”

“Well done,” Lady Charlotte said, sarcastically.

Admiral He ignored her.  It would be easy to take the pistol from his belt and shoot himself in the head.  It would be the easy way out.  He couldn’t expect anything else from his government, unless he chose to defect and he had enough honour to consider that nothing more than treachery.  Besides, taking the blame might be his last and final service to his country and government.  They needed him to be their scapegoat.  It might save the country from the wrath of the entire world.

We’ll see, he thought.  He doubted the plan would work perfectly, but it only had to work enough.  I probably won’t live to see it.

***

“Admiral,” Staci said.  “The Chinese are surrendering.”

She breathed a sigh of relief.  The landing party might have figured out how some of the alien tech worked – the boffins were already dissecting the reports, trying to use them to unlock some more – but she’d been uneasily aware it wouldn’t be easy to turn the alien tech against the Chinese.  They hadn’t exactly been bluffing – not exactly – but the gambit had rested on the hope the Chinese would be so shocked by the loss of the battleship they wouldn’t try to put up a fight.  The boffins thought the alien pseudogravity beams – manipulators – wouldn’t work outside the shell.  If that was true, the Chinese could have fled the sphere and escaped into interstellar space.

But they’d have nowhere to go, she reflected.  Not until we get the tramlines back online ...

“Thank God,” the admiral said.  “Dispatch the boarding parties.”

Staci nodded, stiffly.  The boarding parties had been thrown together from scratch.  A handful of marines, backed up by armed crewmen ... if the Chinese did do something stupid, a lot of people were going to get hurt.  She intended to bring everyone on the surface up into space as quickly as possible and put any Chinese personnel she didn’t need onto the sphere, but ... she cursed Admiral He under her breath.  She wasn’t sure the admiral’s insistence he’d worked alone was true, but it didn’t matter.  The entire situation was as fragile as a piece of ice on a hot summer day.

We can at least keep working on the tramlines, she told herself.  If we can get back to Earth ...

The thought haunted her as the hours wore on.  The Chinese ships didn’t offer any real resistance, beyond some grumbling, but she still feared the worst.  They’d moved their own POWs to the surface too, something that had kept them alive but also made bringing them back into a logistics nightmare.  Staci pushed her crew to the limit, performing tasks they hadn’t been trained to do, hoping and praying nothing went wrong.  She could barely put together prize crews for the capital ships.  If they wound up in a fight, they were doomed.

“I think the boarding operation is more or less completed,” Admiral Dismukes said, later in the evening.  “The Chinese haven’t tried to slow us.”

Staci nodded.  “We need to get the tramlines back,” she said.  “Otherwise ...”

She sighed, inwardly.  The Chinese had given the locals weapons.  A lot of weapons.  Modern rifles – even outdated rifles – would burn through local defences like hot knives through butter, at least until the ammunition ran out.  The Chinese had unleashed a wave of slaughter that would change the sphere forever ... it would be all the worse, she reflected sourly, with so many Chinese ‘advisors’ attached to the local armies.  They didn’t know their commander had ordered them to surrender – the ban on radio transmissions within the sphere remained absolute – and there was no guarantee they would once they got the word.  The nightmare of an advisor going native, of continuing the local wars even against his superior’s orders ... it wouldn’t last, she told herself, once the bullets ran out.  Unless they had a way to replace them ...

“We will try,” Admiral Dismukes said.  “There are other options.”

Staci nodded, then frowned as the intercom bleeped.  “Captain, the landing party has returned to the ship.” Helen reported.  “They’re requesting permission to report to you.”

“Have them sent to my ready room,” Staci said.  “The admiral and I will speak to them here.”

“Aye, Captain.”

“Interesting,” Admiral Dismukes observed.  “What didn’t they want to trust to a secure laser link?”

Staci said nothing as the hatch opened, revealing two tired-looking men.  “Captain,” Captain Colin Lancaster said.  “Tobias was the one who figured out how the alien control system actually worked.”

The shuttle pilot sounded as tired as he looked.  “Captain, the alien system is designed to let the user manipulate the world around him,” he said.  “It’s like ... it’s like using a knife and fork to eat your food, but on a much bigger scale.  The map is the territory as far as they’re concerned, but ... it isn’t so much how you use the fork and knife individually but how they work together.  Each manipulation beam is powerless on its own, yet when they work together, they are extremely powerful.  I used two to create a gravity well that tore the Chinese ship apart.”

“You saved hundreds of lives,” Staci said.  “Perhaps millions.”

“It does offer another possibility,” Admiral Dismukes commented.  “If we can generate a gravity well ahead of a ship, it might pull the ship after the gravity well like a donkey following a carrot.  We might be able to get a ship moving very close to the speed of light.”

“It would still take years to reach the nearest tramline,” Staci countered.  She refused to consider the possibility that all the tramlines might be gone.  It was impossible.  “Even with time dilation, it would still take quite some time.”

“True,” the admiral agreed.  “But it is possible.”

“Or we could adapt fist-tech into powering a starship,” the shuttle pilot said.  “Slowing down at the far end might be a little tricky, though.  We could aim a remote probe at the nearest inhabited system, designed to send a message before it plunges into the void and is never seen again.”

“Later,” Staci said.  The young man looked too tired to think straight.  The idea might be technically practical, but there was no point in trying to put it into action now.  The boffins could work on it once they’d finished mapping the planetoid and searching for other alien command centres.  “Right now, I think you need some rest.”

“Yes, Captain,” the shuttle pilot said.  “I ...”

He yawned.  “Sorry.”

“You did well,” Staci said.  They’d been lucky ... although, the more they studied the alien tech, the more they understood it.  It might be – it was – fantastically advanced and powerful, but it wasn’t magic.  They’d unravel the secrets it held eventually and then ... who knew?  The possibilities were endless.  “Get some rest.”

“Yes, Captain.”

She glanced at Colin Lancaster.  “Do you have anything to add to the report?”

“No, Captain, beyond the fact we haven’t been able to find a way to disconnect the babble zone,” Lancaster said.  “We thought it was a subsonic field of some type, but we moved more sensor gear into the chamber and drew a blank.  Whatever it is, it’s strong and we don’t know how to turn it off.  It may pose a problem if there’s a second one waiting deeper inside.”

“Or more,” Staci agreed.  “We’ve barely scratched the surface, haven’t we?”

“Yes, Captain,” Lancaster said.  “The planetoid, whatever it really is, is huge.  It’ll take years to map and search the entire interior.”

“Years we may not have,” Staci mused.  “What were the Builders thinking?”

“Intelligence test,” the shuttle pilot said.  “You get tested.  If you can get in, you can use it.”

“Or the system was never designed for us,” Lancaster added.  “They presumably built it for themselves.  If they weren’t humanoid, as some people think, they might have completely different ideas of how the world should be.”

Staci nodded, dismissing them.

“It seems odd to go to so much trouble to devise an intelligence test,” Admiral Dismukes said, thoughtfully.  “Perhaps we shouldn’t be trying to pass.”

“Perhaps,” Staci agreed.  “If they think we’re too smart to be allowed to live ...”

She shook her head.  She’d never heard of an unintelligent species building starships and setting out to spread across the galaxy.  That was the stuff of bad science-fantasy.  The Builders hadn’t needed to put together a pair of Dyson Spheres if they wanted to judge someone’s intelligence.  The starships alone were all the proof they needed.  And ...

“It makes no sense,” she said, finally.  “Perhaps the instructions are right in front of us, and we just can’t see them.”

“It’s possible,” the admiral agreed.  “The Tadpoles do have eyes that see more than ours ...”

The intercom beeped, urgently.  “Captain,” Helen said.  She sounded badly shaken.  “We ... we just ... we just got a report from a sensor platform outside the sphere.  We ...”

Staci felt her blood run cold.  “What happened?”

“Captain,” Helen said.  “The star – Dyson One’s star.  It just went out!”

End of Book II

The Trilogy Will Conclude In:

Judgement Day

Coming Soon.

Afterword

I need to start by making a small apology.

As you are aware, if you have followed the series from the beginning, I have tried to keep each book in the trilogies as stand-alone as possible.  The stories make up part of a greater whole, but are not novel-sized chapters in an oversized book.  Personally, I find that very annoying and do my best to avoid it where possible.  Unfortunately, when I started working out the plot for the next two books in the Endeavour trilogy, I found myself having to plan the two books as two halves of a single novel.  I did what I could to isolate the two plot strands, but it was not possible to separate them completely. This resulted in a cliff-hanger which I will do my best to resolve as soon as possible.

This may not be easy.  My health has been a mess and, for various reasons, so has my family’s.  My original schedule for the year has been knocked back quite badly and I’ve found myself racing to meet commitments that, frankly, I should have had done by now.  This is deeply frustrating for me, as well as you, and all I can do is offer my apologies for the delay.  I intend to write Judgement Day as soon as possible, but honesty compels me to admit that it might be at least four to five months before I start work.  I hope this will not be too off-putting.

And now you’ve read this far, I have a request to make.

It’s growing harder to make a living through self-published writing these days.  If you liked this book, please leave a review where you found it, share the link, let your friends know (etc, etc).  Every little helps (particularly reviews).

Thank you.

Christopher G. Nuttall

Edinburgh, 2023

PS. I promise a longer afterword next time.

CGN.

How To Follow

Basic Mailing List - http://orion.crucis.net/mailman/listinfo/chrishanger-list

Nothing, but announcements of new books.

Newsletter - https://gmail.us1.list-manage.com/subscribe?u=c8f9f7391e5bfa369a9b1e76c&id=55fc83a213

New books releases, new audio releases, maybe a handful of other things of interest.

Blog - https://chrishanger.wordpress.com/

Everything from new books to reviews, commentary on things that interest me, etc.

Facebook Fan Page - https://www.facebook.com/ChristopherGNuttall

New books releases, new audio releases, maybe a handful of other things of interest.

Website - http://chrishanger.net/

New books releases, new audio releases, free samples (plus some older books free to anyone who wants a quick read)

Forums - https://authornuttall.com

Book discussions - new, but I hope to expand.

Books2Read - https://books2read.com/author/christopher-g-nuttall/subscribe/19723/

Notifications of new books (normally on the Big River too, but not included in B2R notifications.

Twitter - @chrisgnuttall

New books releases, new audio releases - definitely nothing beyond (no politics or culture war stuff).

If you liked The Lone World, you might like ...

Earth Swap by Dale Cozort.

Near-future Earth suddenly finds itself in a different version of the solar system, one where human civilizations trade and war between planets. Lurking behind those humans: the long-vanished non-human "Builders," who colonized the solar system long ago, seeding it with Earth life. Ward Parke, astronomy enthusiast and presidential advisor, wants to explore this new solar system, but the planets here are on the verge of a genocidal, civilization-ending interplanetary war.

Our Earth is caught in the middle of that looming war, with technology hundreds of years behind the other powers. Its only advantage is an ancient stone library preserved by a now-vanished human civilization from Venus and a mysterious woman called Pandora who may be that civilization’s only survivor.

Chapter One: Meteors & Mars Moons

On a clear September Saturday night, presidential science adviser Ward Parke’s eleven-year-old daughter Bev saw a Martian moon through a five-inch department store telescope.

Bev was tall for her age and slender, with long blond hair. Her brown eyes stared through the cheap telescope, the least capable of twenty amateur telescopes in the field by Stan Baird’s battered white farmhouse. She didn’t take her eyes off the scope. “Dad, Mars looks different.”

Ward heard her, but the words barely registered. Along with the other amateur astronomers, he stared at three fireballs that flashed into visibility at the center of the sky, then streaked west.

Stan Baird stood to his full six-foot six inches, bulky in the starlight, and whooped. “That’s what I’m talking about!”

The fireballs lit up the sky, then faded to dull red fast-moving afterglow. Bev looked up. “What did I miss?”

Ward hesitated. “Just shooting stars.”

“Just shooting stars? And Jupiter is kind of big.” Stan looked around the field. “Anybody get cameras on them?”

Two people captured the fireballs on their cell phones. The others clustered around them. Stan said, “Had to be satellites with left-over maneuvering fuel, because they maneuvered, probably when the fuel tanks burned through. But where did they go? And why did they reenter at the same time?”

Bev said it again. “Mars looks different.” Ward glanced at her, then returned his attention to the fireball videos.“It has a moon big enough I can see it on my telescope.”

Stan grinned. “When I get time, I’ll tell you about Mars and its moons.” He tried to pat her blond head, but she ducked and stalked back to her telescope.

Ward tore his eyes off the video. He stretched to his full five-foot-eight inches and ran a hand across short brown hair. “Parenting time.” He followed Bev to her telescope. “Martian moons are tiny. Captured asteroids.”

“I know. I’m not an idiot. Look for yourself.”

Ward looked. “That’s weird.” He turned to the knot of people around the cell phones. “Stan, you need to see this!”

Stan strolled over. “Are you seeing Martian moons too now?”

“I’m seeing something I don’t understand,” Ward said. “Should anything look close to Mars tonight?”

“I don’t think so,” Stan said. He pivoted his telescope. “Now that’s interesting. Whatever she sees is a disc on my scope.”  He grinned at Bev. “Things are hopping. Three fireballs and maybe a comet. Comet Bev?” Stan raised his voice. “Starship emergency. Get scopes and cameras on Mars.”

Someone groaned, but the group meandered away from the videos and refocused their scopes. Stan asked. “What looks like it’s near Mars and shows a disc.”

Someone said, “That’s easy. Nothing.”

“And yet there it is.” Stan studied a star chart with a dim red flashlight. “Shouldn’t be anything there. The youngest member of the Starship may have found something new—not a Martian moon, but maybe a comet or asteroid. Let’s get its orbit.”

Ward pulled Stan aside. “Keep Bev out of this. Pat found another psycho boyfriend.”

“Your ex-wife heading for another rampage?” Stan asked. “Stick around tomorrow while we blow crap up. Pat won’t come out here. I scare her.”

“Someday the feds will cart you all off. With my job, I can’t be there when that happens.”

“It’s all legal and safe,” Stan said. He pointed at his T-shirt. “‘Socially responsible pyromaniac.” He grinned. “Which do we obsess on first, the mystery fireballs or the comet?”

He studied the videos frame by frame. “I swear fireball number one tried to get away from the others. And based on the trajectory, it came down maybe ten miles from here.”

#

Ward and Bev went home, avoiding Stan’s pyrotechnics. Ward worked in his home office on unclassified projects Sunday afternoon. The Internet was initially full of fireball videos, but then the news focus shifted to the new Martian moon, apparently a previously unknown Kuiper Belt object captured by the Red Planet.

He briefly regretted not getting Bev credit for the discovery, but several other amateurs had reported it almost simultaneously. He also felt uneasy. The fireballs and new moon came too close together.

Stan called and texted several times, but Ward ignored him. Finally, he decided he had left Bev alone long enough and exited the office.

Bev met him at the door. “Stan’s on the phone. He’s been calling all afternoon.”

Ward reluctantly took the phone. Stan said, “I bet you think I’m going to get you in trouble.”

“Aren’t you?”

“Probably. I need to stop by. Can you get Katrina over?”

“Why? So, you can snipe at each other?” Katrina, Ward’s older sister, had dated Stan once, half a meal at a local restaurant interrupted by a shouting match. “She says you’re a bad influence.”

“That I am. Can you get her over? And take Bev to your parents.”

“The whirlpool named Stan. I’m getting sucked into your drama. Again. Katrina won’t come if she knows you’re here.”

Stan laughed. “Maybe I shouldn’t have told her she needed a life transplant. Don’t tell her I’m coming. We need a woman there. And I’ll need to drive straight into your garage.”

“Anything new on Bev’s moon?”

“Yeah. Life as we know it is over,” Stan said. “I’m not kidding. The new Martian moon is over 700 miles in diameter. A captured Kuiper Belt object? I don’t believe that. Even if I did, Venus has a moon too, now. And oceans. And it rotates every twenty-two hours. It’s like we’re in a different solar system. And we’re not alone. Radio amateurs are picking up radio signals from the moon, the asteroid belt, Mars, and Venus. And that’s not even the tin hat stuff. I’ll tell you about that when I get to your house and show you some of it.”

“How do you know all this?” Ward asked. “Why haven’t I heard anything?”

“Your home office isn’t secure.” Stan said. “They would send it by secure channels. And your big-name friends won’t put the pieces together as fast as I do, Mr. Presidential Adviser. The Starship knows all.”

“The Starship is computer, astronomy and amateur radio geeks.”

Stan said, “Which means we know all the tin hat crap. And I have the queen of the tin hat sitting by me. I call her Pandora.”

“Now I’m intrigued.” Ward settled back in his chair “But Bev still likes spending time with me. That won’t last long.”

“Teenagers are instruments of karma. They do all the rotten stuff to you that you did to your parents. Only way to avoid it is to not have kids. See you at six.”

Ward procrastinated, then called Katrina. She seemed surprisingly willing to come over, though she asked, “Why do you put up with Baird the oversized jerk?”

“He’s the brightest guy I know, among the top ten programmers in the country.”

“Have you ever noticed that he acts large and in charge, but you make the tough decisions?”

“That’s not the way we think. We don’t care who’s in charge.”

Katrina arrived shortly before Stan pulled into the garage.

An extremely tall woman, within an inch of Stan’s six-foot-six, got out with Stan. Her face and hair were porcelain white, like a salad bowl. Her face was totally without wrinkles and expressionless. Like a giant doll. She wore an enormous T-shirt with ‘Socially Responsible Pyromaniac’ and cartoon explosions on the front and clutched a dull-metal suitcase to her chest.

Stan grinned at Ward. “You look bum-foozled. Meet Pandora. She’s not from around here.”

Chapter Two: Pandora Rocks

“She wandered in this morning while we were blowing crap up,” Stan said. “Naked and wound around the suitcase. Hasn’t said a word. Looks like she’s about to start twitching. Doesn’t seem to be contagious.”

“It hasn’t been long enough to know. You sure Katrina needs to be here?”

“I’m right here,” Katrina said. “And I’m also wondering why I’m here.”

“Mystery lady may respond better to a woman. She won’t talk to any of us.”

“She’s got good taste, at least.” Katrina smiled up at the woman and motioned for her to come in.

Pandora walked hesitantly up the steps to the kitchen, her feet bare. Her legs and arms were the same ceramic white as her face.

“Did you weird, sad people get desperate enough to make a woman in your lab?” Katrina asked. “And couldn’t you find her shoes?”

“Doesn’t seem to understand shoes,” Stan said. “As I said, she came wandering in.”

“If that’s true, what are you getting us into?” Katrina steered the woman to an overstuffed chair, which looked small with her in it.

“You said you were bringing in tin hat,” Ward said. “I assume she is it.”

“That would be true,” Stan said. “But she doesn’t even start to be as tin hat as what I’m about to tell you.” He glanced at Katrina. “You can sit back and be comforting. This next bit is above your mental pay grade.”

“Play nice,” Ward said. “She’s helping us. What’s more tin hat than a big Martian moon?”

“This is far more threatening,” Stan said. “The Earth/Moon system is now surrounded by a globe of fair-sized asteroids, each of them maybe half a mile across. That can’t be natural. They couldn’t stay in those orbits without working at it. Too many gravitational pulls and velocity differences. Somebody or something is deliberately keeping them in those orbits. Do you realize how much power that would take?”

Ward shook his head. “A lot, but beyond that I have no real idea. Why would someone do that?”

“Planetary defense maybe.” Stan closed his eyes and suddenly looked exhausted and grim. “They would probably help if someone was throwing dinosaur-killer asteroids at the planet, or smaller asteroids at high speed. That implies that someone out there can throw that kind of crap at us and is likely enough to do it that someone put a lot of money into stopping it.” He opened his eyes and managed a grin. “I always wanted a more interesting solar system, but this one is a tough neighborhood.”

“So, you’re talking science fiction,” Katrina said. “I can tune out.”

“There is another thing that almost goes without saying,” Stan said. He glanced at Katrina. “But for the physics challenged among us, Earth didn’t just go into another solar system. It swapped places with a planet so like Earth that it almost has to be an alternate reality Earth.”

“And you know this how?” Katrina asked.

“The moon had to be orbiting something,” Stan said. “And that something had to have the same mass as Earth or the moon here would be in a different orbit, either closer or further away. We’re in the right place around the sun, because if we weren’t we wouldn’t be in the right spot for the moon to orbit around us.”

“How do you know the planet that was here, this solar system’s version of Earth, went to our solar system?” Katrina asked.

“Surprisingly good question,” Stan said. “We don’t, not really. It could have gone somewhere else, yet another reality, in which case the moon in our solar system would go pinballing around our solar system, tossed out of orbit by centrifugal force like a kid who lets go of a merry-go-round.”

“How do you swap planets?” Ward asked.

“Technology advanced enough to be indistinguishable from magic.” Stan shook his head. “Also, technology that could squash us like bugs. The more interesting question is why they swapped Earths. I can only see two reasons. Either the other Earth didn’t want to stay in this solar system for some reason, or someone else in this solar system didn’t want them here and had the power to kick them out. Either way, this new solar system has teeth. We may wish we’re back in our own boring solar system before long.”

Ward tried to wrap his mind around Stan’s claims but couldn’t. He sat uncomfortably across from the tall, milk white woman. “Pandora?”

“She’s carrying a box, so until she gives us a name, she’s Pandora.”

“The suitcase? Pandora’s Box. Has she opened it?”

“Not yet.”

The woman’s eyes darted around the room; her face expressionless, still clutching the suitcase.

Stan grinned. “Corporate drone, meet the creature from the milk-white lagoon.”

“When you tried to talk to her, did you try—I don’t know—Swedish?” Katrina asked.

“I tried every language I know and computer translations of the ones I don’t. Didn’t work. She’s ET.”

The woman abruptly opened the suitcase and took out three thumb-sized black stones. She handed one to Katrina, then glanced at Ward before handing one to Stan.

“Pandora opens her box. I wish you hadn’t called her that.” Ward stared at the stones. “Looks like you got lumps of coal.”

The grin faded when neither Stan nor Katrina answered. Ward shook Stan and got no response. He tried unsuccessfully to knock the stone out of his friend’s hand. Finally, he shook the woman. She didn’t react.

Ward swore. They all remained motionless while seconds ticked by, still grasping the black stones.

Finally, Stan said. “It’s not coal. Looks like an Apache Tear. Thank you.” He handed her his watch. “Since we’re exchanging gifts.”

Ward stared at the woman. She seemed different, though he couldn’t put his finger on why. “What just happened?”

“We may have a breakthrough,” Stan said. He yawned. “And I’m so sleepy I can’t keep my eyes open.”

“The stones did something to both of you. You were in a trance for maybe two minutes.”

Stan glanced at his watch, now dangling from Pandora’s hand. “I didn’t feel anything odd.”

Katrina set her rock on the coffee table. “This is too weird. Tell me what’s going on or I’m gone.” Nobody responded. “I’m really leaving.”

Pandora sagged back in her chair, her eyes closing. A tiny snore emanated from her. Stan sprawled on the couch and curled up so his bulk was mostly on the cushions. “Ward, we’ll stay awake in shifts. You take first watch. Wake me up in a couple hours. Katrina, sleep in the guest bedroom.” He grinned at Ward. “And I’m ordering you around in your own home.”

“I’m used to it,” Ward said. “You didn’t feel weird when she gave you the rock?”

“Nothing.”

“Something happened. You aren’t going to turn into pod people, are you?”

“Your sister was born a pod person, and no power on Earth could make me one.”

“No power from Earth,” Ward said.

“I’m still leaving,” Katrina said. “Unless you tell me what’s going on.”

“There’s no point,” Stan said. “If you believed me, you would run screaming to your cubicle until it went away.”

Ward stood beside his sister’s chair. “Don’t go. We need you. You don’t want to know why.”

“Obviously I do, but I’m too tired to drive home. Don’t let the giant jerk get you in even more trouble.”

“If nothing happened, why are you both exhausted? It’s only seven o’clock.”

“I’ve had a long day,” Katrina said. She wandered to the guest room. By the time Ward turned back to him, Stan was snoring.

“I’m serious,” Ward said. “Don’t turn into pod people.”

#

Pandora abruptly opened her pale blue eyes. She looked up at Ward through long milk-white lashes. “It’s all gone.”

Ward jumped. “Crap! You scared me.”

The woman went on quietly, her English unaccented. “Not even dust. An inferno. Hot enough to melt lead.”

A tear rolled down her cheek, nearly invisible on her too-white skin.

“You speak English.” Ward glanced at Stan. The big man still snored on the couch. Should I wake him?

“Now I speak English,” The woman said. “I copied it from your friends’ minds. I didn’t hurt them. It’s a way of learning quickly.”

“You’re from?”

“Venus, apparently so long ago that your friends have no memories of us.” She sighed. “Don’t wake them yet. They’ll have too many questions.”

Ward studied her face. She’s human enough she could walk down the street, and nobody would think twice about her if she was a foot shorter and acting like a mime. He grinned at that, then glanced at Stan, half expecting his friend to sit up and tell Ward how gullible he was for buying into another practical joke. Stan kept snoring. “I have a few questions myself, like how you got here.”

“I don’t know. I went into stasis and woke up in an escape pod near where your friend found me.”

Ward wasn’t sure if he believed that. If Pandora was his kind of human, her body language would have told him she was holding something back. “Why didn’t you try to talk sooner?”

Pandora stood abruptly and paced, bare feet on the carpet. “I didn’t know if you were friends or enemies.”

“Do you now?”

“Not completely.” She stopped and looked down at him, tall and slender, almost fragile, still clutching the suitcase. “But I’m alone, with nothing to lose.”

“Stan hinted that Venus is inhabited now.”

“I saw that in his mind. I don’t understand.”

“That makes two of us.” Ward said.

Abruptly Pandora’s knees went rubbery, and she swayed, then fell toward the coffee table. Ward grabbed her and guided her gently to her chair. She was surprisingly light for her height, and her arms felt soft and warm, a pleasant contrast to her porcelain appearance.

“Are you okay? What happened?”

The woman closed her eyes. “I felt your friend in me.”

“Stan? Of course. You copied his memories.”

“I felt him, not just his memories. He tried to move my hands.”

Ward’s arm was still around her, her face uncomfortably close. Kissing range—or germ-catching range. He fought a wild impulse to close the inches that separated their lips. Finally, he gently tugged his arm free. A hint of a smile played across her cold white face. “Thank you.”

“What’s your name?”

“Your friend called me Pandora. That’s as good a name as any.”

“Do you have plague, war or famine in your suitcase?”

“No, something far more dangerous. Knowledge. The greatest library of three worlds.”

#

That Sunday night, Katrina dreamed of being on Venus, with the sun three times the size it appeared from Earth.

Her dream Venus was in decay. That decay was subtle where she stood in her dream—sections of the tramlines where unrepaired rails jolted passenger cars and tall, milk-white human figures sprawled in makeshift shelters under a bridge.

A tall man with milk-white skin stood beside her, dressed in a tunic-like uniform. “It still looks like it could go on forever,” he said. The words weren’t in English, but she understood them. “But it will be gone in fifty years. Our grandchildren will be savages roaming ruins of a city they can’t comprehend, maintain or rebuild.”

“Is it really that bad?” Katrina’s dream lips asked. “The knowledge is more accessible now than ever.”

“But it doesn’t matter. Nobody wants it. Nobody understands how much they need it. It will crumble to dust before anyone understands they need it.”

Abruptly she was in a flyer, with the man beside her. They swooped over a plateau and down a river. When the oversized sun faded below the horizon, much of the western plateau remained dark.

“They won’t clean it up,” the man said. “A gouge in our world spreading death on the winds, but they won’t fix it.”

Despair spread through Katrina’s dream body. The man continued. “The other plants will fail too and spread debris and death. By then nobody will know how to fix them.”

“I’ll do it.”

The milk-white man nodded. “You’ll be in space, in stasis, waiting for the generation that finds its way back.”

The dream transported her again, to an apartment overlooking a city. Tiny monkeys, not much bigger than hamsters, bounced from one high spot to another until they landed on her shoulders. She gently rubbed their heads and they curled up, making peeping sounds that relaxed her but filled her with a sense of loss.

Chapter Three: Pandora’s Library-The Solar System

“A library,” Ward said. “What makes it dangerous? Why can’t it be copied?”

Pandora gripped her suitcase tighter. Her hand twitched.

“He moved your hand.” Ward stared openly at the woman. “Or you’re a great actress.” His mind skittered around where the woman came from. Stan, if this a practical joke I’ll string you up by your fingernails.

Pandora’s hand twitched again. She swore, then got up and paced. “I have knowledge from hundreds of people and none of them are inside me. Maybe I am seeing shadows.”

“Maybe our minds work differently. Or, more likely, this is a practical joke.”

Pandora stalked over to Stan and stared down at him. She whispered, “Get out of my mind!”

“As a joke this ranks up there with his best,” Ward said. “Hire an actress, apply white makeup, plant some ideas in my head and then bring you. I’ll admit I bought it for a while.”

She turned toward him. “He would do that. But he didn’t.”

“Then show me your library.”

Pandora shook her head. “It is dangerous.”

Ward studied her arms, looking for scars or vaccination marks. Her skin was flawless. There was no sign of disturbed makeup where he had gripped her arm.

She stared down at him, hands and jaw clinched. Finally, “You want to see the library? I’ll show you. It doesn’t matter. Nothing matters anymore.” She took a black stone from the case and held it under a lamp. Spheres appeared near the ceiling, spinning slowly.

“The sun” Pandora pointed, then shifted to a much smaller ball. “And Jupiter. And debris. If we didn’t live on a piece of the debris that’s how we would see the solar system.”

“That sounds like something Stan would say.” Ward approached the Earth globe. It got larger as he approached.

Pandora smiled. “Am I still one of your friend’s jokes?”

The blue and green ball of Earth rotated slowly in front of Ward, seemingly the size of a basketball. The miniature Earth was startlingly lifelike, down to clouds obscuring Western North America. A strait separated North and South America. Greenland was ice free and green.

“This isn’t exactly our planet.” Ward glanced at Pandora. “Are your North and South America still separate?”

“No. But they were millions of years ago, in the time of the Builders.”

Ward shifted his attention to Mars. The large moon emerged from behind the planet. He slid a flashlight in its path. It went on in its course. “Holograms, but more sophisticated.”

“Made by the Builders. Still working though their cities are dust.”

Ward moved his head toward Mars. The globe expanded, then the view abruptly shifted to ground level, and he was in a city of narrow overhead walkways. He came face to face with one of the inhabitants and jumped when it seemed to walk through him. It was shorter than him and lightly built. It resembled a giant spider monkey, but with a higher forehead and a more expressive face. The being walked on, followed by thousands of its kind, some riding in large open carts.

He pulled back. “You said the library is dangerous. Why?”

“All knowledge is dangerous,” Pandora said. “This is Builder-Tech, left from the ones that went to the planets before us. We never figured out how to make them, though we imitated them as well as we could.”

Ward glanced at Stan, who was still snoring on the couch. “This is probably beyond what even my obsessive friend could do, but improbable claims need iron-clad proof.”

“Do any test you want.”

Ward stepped toward the outer solar system. “Let’s look at the Kuiper Belt.” Globes moved through the outer reaches of the solar system, some of them apparently larger than Mars. “Let’s pretend I believe you. Then what?”

Pandora moved the rock away from the lamp. The globes faded. Her face went expressionless. “Then nothing.” She sat unmoving, then abruptly unclenched her arms from around the case, plunked it on the coffee table. Another tear ran down her cheek and she stumbled to the door, fumbled at the latch, then ran outside. “Nothing!”

#

Katrina Parke woke Monday morning with sun in her eyes. She jumped up. “Ward! Why didn’t you wake me? I’m late to work.”

Pandora’s case sat in the living room, a black rock beside it. Stan was snoring on the couch. There was no sign of Pandora. Katrina ran to Ward’s bedroom. The door was open, the bed neatly made and the room empty. She yelled Ward’s name again.

Stan sat up, blond hair disheveled. “Where are Ward and Pandora? Bev has to be at school in forty-five minutes.”

“Ward isn’t here,” Katrina said. “I’ll call in late, get her to school, and cut my brother a new orifice. Find Ward. I’ll glue myself together. I’m out the door in ten minutes.”

Katrina brushed the wrinkles out of her clothes and wrote a note to Ward. Stan came out as Katrina finished the note. “Still not here?”

Katrina shook her head. “You look even grosser than usual.”

Stan grinned, “And you look like you slept in your clothes.”

“Because I did.”

“Why don’t you call his cell phone?”

“Because I’m half asleep.” Katrina dialed on the way to her car and got Ward’s voice mail. “This is Katrina. I’m taking Bev to school, which means I’m late to work. Call me two hours ago.”

Stan pulled his van out of the garage as she got in her car. He yelled, “Did you hear anything last night?”

“I was totally out. Find him.”

She tried not to look worried when she picked up Bev. “Stan sucked your dad into some silly game.”

After she dropped Bev off, Katrina called Stan’s cell phone. She got his voice mail too. She said, “Hi jerk, get my brother back or I’ll ring your oversized neck.”

#

Earlier that morning, Ward flexed his wrists against handcuffs that held them to a heavy wooden chair. He glared across a dark storage unit at Pandora’s tall figure, tied in a chair near him. “You picked a lousy time to run off in a snit.”

“A snit? Everyone and everything I know is gone. That’s not a snit.” She paused. “At least I don’t think it is.”

“Whatever you ran off in, you picked a bad time.” Ward scooted the chair toward her. “You’re super-tech woman. Can’t you pick the lock on your handcuffs?  Hairpin? Power of your mind?”

“No. And why would I?”

“Because we’ve been kidnapped, I need to be at work, and I have a daughter.”

“I’m sorry you’re away from her. I told you my library was dangerous.”

Three men dressed in neatly tailored gray suits came in and turned on a light. Ward’s eyes snapped closed, but he forced them open.

A man with curly hair in a near-Afro and a tiny Hitler mustache said something to Pandora in a language that consisted mostly of clicks and guttural, vaguely German-sounding monosyllables.

She shook her head. “I don’t understand. Do you speak English?”

“Of course. But why speak a barbarian language when neither of us are barbarians.”

“We may have no other common language.”

“And that’s a mystery,” Hitler Mustache said. “You’re not of this world, but where are you from? Why are you important?”

The two men behind Hitler Mustache held pistol-like objects and fidgeted, apparently uncomfortable in their suits. Ward said, “Jeans and tennis shoes are more comfortable.”

Hitler mustache strolled over and stared down at him. “Really? Any other tips? Is our hair okay?” He slapped Ward hard across the face. “Is my tie straight? Do these pants make my butt look big?”

Your mustache and that hair makes you look like a clown. Ward choked back those words.

“I picked you up along with the woman because if she’s reluctant to talk, cutting off your fingers might make her more cooperative,” Hitler Mustache said. “Do you understand?”

Ward flexed his wrists again. They were thoroughly secured, as were his ankles. He said, with a confidence he didn’t feel, “For now.”

“You should feel more fear than you appear to. We’ll work on that.” Hitler Mustache turned to Pandora. “Want your friend losing fingers? An eye? A leg?”

Pandora shrugged. “I barely know him. Why don’t you just ask your questions?”

“Fear brings honest answers,” Hitler Mustache said. “And removing fingers has an intrinsic appeal. What is your name? Where are you from?”

“I’m Sally Foresman. I’m an actress. A man hired me to play a joke on his friends.”

Hitler Mustache slammed his fist into Ward’s jaw. “That’s the last time it won’t be a finger.”

“What do you want me to say? If I’m not Sally Foresman who am I?”

“I don’t know,” Hitler Mustache said. “You came here in a pod towed by a Pochva scout ship. You were chased by a dozen warships, probably Martian. That tells me you’re valuable. The Martians knew coming to Earth orbit was suicide. Yet they came and died, and suddenly our version of Earth was replaced by this one. How and why did the versions of Earth switch? What was in the pod or the scout ship that was worth sacrificing a dozen warships?”

Chapter Four: Katrina at Work

Katrina staggered into her office and got her most urgent work done, retreating into her Monday morning routine. At noon, she tried Ward’s cell phone again, then called Stan. He hadn’t contacted Ward either.

Katrina said, “We need to call the police.”

“They won’t do anything for twenty-four hours.”

“Then we need to call the feds. You brought ET to my brother’s house.”

“The Secret Service is already nosing around.”

She tried to stay calm. “You’re supposed to be Mr. Brilliant. Find him.”

“Working on it.”

“What about Bev and his work?”

“The Starship takes care of its own. Someone will call work for him. By the way, I looked in the suitcase Pandora kept hugging. It’s all rocks, worth maybe a hundred bucks for the bunch. I don’t know why she held onto it so tight, then left it.”

“You have this huge geek network,” Katrina said. “Use it.”

“Already on it,” Stan said. “The Starship takes care of its own.”

“I keep hearing that,” Katrina said. “Now back it up.”

“Someone grabbed him and doll lady. I followed their tracks in the dew this morning.”

“And you didn’t tell me this morning?”

“I wasn’t sure.”

“You think the feds have Ward?”

“No idea. I talked to a congressional aide who knows everything that goes on in Washington. He says I won’t get anywhere on Ward, and if I push it, I’ll end up where I can’t push anymore.”

“What did you get my brother into?”

“Whatever it is, you’re either on the inside and terrified, or you’re outside the toughest info blackout the aide has ever seen.”

“Get him back.” Katrina hesitated then said, “I had a weird dream this morning. Very vivid.”

“You too, huh? And you knew you were on Venus. Porcelain girl did something to us, but you were already a pod person. This could be an improvement.”

“I thought you were genius guy. Get him back.” She hung up.

Katrina left work early to pick up Bev. She would pay for the short day later but had no choice. Before she picked Bev up, she stopped by Ward’s. Her note was still on the table. She drove on, tried to make sense of the previous night. Who was Pandora? Why did she leave? Did Ward go with her? And why did I dream about Venus? Then she arrived at school.

Bev ran over. “Where’s dad?”

Katrina decided to tell as much of the truth as she could. “I’ve been trying to figure that out all afternoon. I can’t find him.”

Bev looked like she was fighting back tears. “Why hasn’t he called?”

“Maybe his phone is dead.”

#

––––––––

Pandora stared at Hitler Mustache with her startlingly blue eyes. “Obviously I have defenses against torture,” She smiled. “I have no desire for continued existence and a choice of exits. I can stop my heart or activate an explosive hidden in my body. You are an annoying little man without power, and I would enjoy blowing you up.”

Hitler Mustache pulled a tiny, sharp-bladed knife. “I don’t believe you. But I’m a businessman. Perhaps we can do business. Tell me something valuable.”

“The Starship is hunting for us,” Ward said. “And they will find us.”

“The Starship?” Hitler Mustache asked. “Your Secret Service is looking for you. They’ll eventually find your body here.” He held the knife in the light. “I like using this. Tell me something important.”

Pandora abruptly glanced at the overhead door. “You are about to die.” Hitler Mustache turned, then ducked. Three holes appeared in the storage unit door. The gray-suited men exploded red at their midsections and sagged.

Hitler Mustache dived toward Pandora, pulling a ‘pistol’. It spewed flame and more holes appeared in the door. The overhead light flared out, leaving only light from the holes in the door.

Ward rocked the chair arms side to side. One arm wobbled a little. He kept rocking it, his body tensed against whatever hit the two men. Blood pools spread and merged from their bodies.

Pandora’s eyes met Ward’s. Sunlight from the holes in the door played over the letters of her borrowed t-shirt. She whispered, “They’re trying for a shot that doesn’t hit me.”

Hitler Mustache pushed closer to Pandora. She shrank away from him, then butted him in the head. He fell, losing his ‘pistol’. She swayed her chair back and stomped on his stomach. The air whooshed out of him. She tipped her chair over and landed her elbow and the chair arm on his head. He went limp. She grinned at Ward. “Impressive, huh?”

“Why did you just sound exactly like Stan?” Ward asked. “You’re officially a scary sort-of human being. You need to get that under control.”

“I don’t know how.”

Ward kept flexing his chair arm. Finally, he pried it loose and turned to the other arm, rocking it loose too. That let him untie his legs.

He ran to Pandora and freed her, kicking Hitler Mustache in the side of the head and grabbing his pistol on the way.

“They can see through the door,” Pandora said. “Thermal sensors. They know we’re loose. They probably don’t want to kill us.”

Ward nodded. He tied Hitler Mustache, taking pleasure in drawing the ropes extra tight. “We should kill him.”

“Go ahead.”

“I can’t. I should though.”

A siren sounded, got closer. Someone shouted in an unfamiliar language, followed by running footsteps.

A female voice outside the door yelled, “Don’t shoot! I’m a friend!”

Ward whispered, “I don’t recognize the voice.” He yelled, “Who are you?”

“No time to explain. I’m opening the door. Don’t shoot. We have seconds to get out of here.”

A young brown-haired woman swung the overhead door up, a pistol poised. She stood over Hitler Mustache. “Gregor himself. Is he dead?”

Pandora said, “I don’t think so.”

“You should kill him.”

“Why don’t you?”

“For me it might be murder.” She motioned for them to follow her. “The police and feds are coming. So are more Pochva. You don’t want to be caught in the firefight.”

“Why are we safer going with you?” Ward asked. “The feds might be our best play.”

“Feds or police can’t stop the Pochva,” the young woman said.

Ward wondered briefly who the Pochva were while he ducked under the half-open door. Sirens got louder, from multiple directions.

A gray SUV roared into the row of storage units. Holes stitched in the storage unit doors behind Ward. He jumped in the car, landing in Pandora’s lap.

Purchase On The Big River NOW!