Redemption Protocol (Contact) (35 page)

There was silence as they considered this.

“Mmm.”

“Gosh.”

Kemensky frowned. He pointed at the adjacent tower image.

“But then why would the simplest things always appear at the top?”

Weaver grinned from ear to ear. She couldn’t help it.

“Ah ha.”

Fournier brightened. Weaver nodded at him. Kemensky’s brow furrowed. Darkwood’s face lit up.

“Because they can fly!”

Touvenay tipped his head to one side, sampling this thought.

“And as they grow, they get larger and heavier,” Touvenay speculated.

“And lazier?” Darkwood said.

There was laughter.

Touvenay looked thoughtful.

“If they even have the concept of laziness.”

Weaver felt a rush of wonder.

“This is extraordinary. We’re so privileged to see this.”

“Maybe it's our destiny,” Darkwood said, which was so brutally unscientific that it almost derailed the mood.

Touvenay gestured at the images around them.

“Can you imagine the rubbish that humanity would fill our walls with? The alien visitors would turn up and all our holy books would be written on the walls. And they’d just...”

“Fly away?” Weaver said.

There was more laughter. Fournier’s tone was gentle as he spoke in mild rebuke.

“Perhaps they would find our religious writings as inspirational as many of us do. Maybe they’re religious as well.”

Touvenay stiffened.

“Well, we were evolving away from religion, relatively, until the Dem arrived.”

Weaver quickly interjected before Fournier could respond.

“Let's not get side tracked here.”

Touvenay turned back to the map, musing thoughtfully.

“There’s something in this vault beneath the Colosseum that seems to indicate it's a universal equation solution, or a dynamic equation key, or... an index of some kind. The way it's signified, I think it might be some kind of... assistance with allocating meaning. Like a key or a dictionary.”

Weaver raised an eyebrow.

“Or a library?”

“A library under the Colosseum?” Kemensky said.

Touvenay turned with a smile.

“Ah.”

 59. 

Havoc entered the Hub Hab just as Jafari came in through the far side. Jafari held out his hand as they met.

“I found six relay transmitters.”

Havoc raised his eyebrows in surprise.

“Six. You only found them now?”

What a pointless question, Havoc thought, as the words left his mouth.

Jafari nodded.

“I think they only started transmitting recently.”

“As we get closer to Plash.”

“The thing is,” Jafari said, “unless they were sending a lot of data...”

Havoc frowned down at the collection of surveillance devices.

“There is more than one agent on board.”

Jafari nodded.

“Nightmare.”

Yamamoto came in, her expression serious. But then, Havoc thought, Yamamoto was like every ship captain in history. She
always
looked serious.

Yamamoto came to a halt beside them.

“I've just found Hwan.”

“Where was she?” Jafari asked.

“Just off our stern. By now, about thirty kilometers behind us.”

Jafari’s mouth fell open.

“What?!”

“At first I thought her body was debris that had slipped off disc four. I think she opened the lock and stepped out. The lock was activated from inside so it must have been voluntary. She'd disabled her comms as well.”

Jafari looked horrified.

“You think she did it to herself?”

“The system audit trail confirms it. The shame of her confession, it must have been too much. Or her contamination.”

Havoc considered this.

“Any footage?”

Yamamoto nodded.

“She walks up and steps out.”

“Hmm.”

Jafari looked uncertain.

“I thought she seemed alright.”

Havoc thought about the breakdowns he'd witnessed.

“Some people crumble in inches. Others stay strong until they fall apart. We need more information. I would treat it as suspicious for now. Does Tyburn know?”

Yamamoto nodded.

“He's investigating now.”

Havoc noticed Jafari looking at him oddly. He looked back. Jafari pointed at the wall.

“Shall I... you know...”

Havoc turned and looked at Marsac on the tribute wall.

Revelation

 60. 

It waited. It waited well.

It didn't mind waiting. It had no concept of boredom. It was stimulated by the presence of prey and there were none.

It was what it was. A perfect killer.

It didn't resemble an evolved being. Evolution clutters a species with a host of redundant features to deal with bygone challenges. Humans share eighty five percent of their DNA with mice. You could call humans mice without tails, except, of course, that humans still carry the DNA for a tail. Prior to birth every standard human fetus grows lanugo hair – a downy fur coat – before shedding and then digesting it. It's just another pointless evolutionary cul-de-sac. In that sense the creature was unnatural. There was not a single unnecessary constituent of its being. It had been perfectly designed and manufactured to achieve its purpose.

And that purpose was killing.

More precisely, species elimination.

It waited.

 61. 

Havoc checked the configuration of a static defense station while the disc five hangar bustled with activity around him.

Jafari jogged past Havoc. He was twice as busy with Hwan gone. Tyburn had been adamant Hwan's death was suicide and not another security lapse. Others had been quick to agree. Wishful thinking, Havoc thought. For himself, he wondered why someone would travel all the way across the ship to step out of a lock. Tyburn speculated that Hwan had gone there to think. Whatever the truth of it, Hwan had joined Marsac on the tribute wall. There was no memorial, though – there wasn’t time.

Chaucer moped on the far side of the hangar, morbid and withdrawn. It might be hytelline withdrawal or maybe Chaucer was shocked by the realization of what he'd done to Brennen. Havoc hadn't said anything about it. Chaucer would stay on the
Intrepid
to look after Leveque, who after Hwan’s 'suicide' was now confined to her cabin.

Havoc glanced up as Whittenhorn, Yamamoto and Tyburn approached him. Havoc was to oversee security on the surface while Tyburn supervised from the
Intrepid
. Havoc thought either Tyburn had a lot of confidence in him or he thought he was expendable. Maybe both. Certainly, the ‘disposable’ argument would have carried a lot of weight with Whittenhorn.

“Thirty minutes until the Colosseum comes into the shadow side,” Yamamoto said.

Tyburn gestured at Havoc’s kit.

“Ready to go?”

Havoc nodded.

“Save for final checks. What about the other ships?”

“They’re less than twenty four hours from launching,” Yamamoto said.

There was a subtle vibration through the hangar deck. Yamamoto turned to their Acting Commander.

“Disc six is clear.”

Whittenhorn nodded.

“Good. We'll move over shortly.”

Whittenhorn and his newly willing assistants, the lawyers Bergeron and Humberstone, were going to move over to disc six to supervise surface operations. In the meantime Bergeron and Humberstone had, and Havoc was still grappling with this,
posted him
a formal notification of their pending legal action on shipnet without saying anything to his face. He looked across at the two lawyers as they struggled into their exploration suits. Abbott caught Havoc’s eye and, with a wide smile, he drew a finger across his throat. From your hand to God's ear, Havoc thought.

Havoc picked up the static defense station and carried it to the rear of the shuttle. Novosa sat cross-legged under the shuttle fuselage with her eyes closed. Havoc smiled.

“Last minute practice?”

Novosa kept her eyes closed.

“Meditation.”

“If you meet the Buddha, kill him.”

Novosa spoke serenely with her eyes still shut.

“No stunts planned this time?”

Havoc put down the static defense station.

“Not this time. But a plan is only a plan.”

“Meaning?”

“It's only a successful mission if you come back, Novosa.”

Novosa smiled.

“Coming back is nice.”

“Yeah well hopefully the drones will take the hits.”

He was referring to the guardians at the pyramid. Novosa opened her eyes.

“You can’t eat hope for dinner, Havoc. I think we should just take them out.”

Havoc looked equivocal.

“Assuming we can.”

Novosa aimed along her finger and pulled an imaginary trigger.

“Bite off more than you can chew, then chew it.”

Havoc laughed.

“Says the girl in the armored citadel.”

“How else can a girl be in eight places at once?”

Havoc laughed again.

“Apparently destroying the guardians is a failure of diplomacy. At least, our Ambassador thinks so.”

“Hence the ban on vaporizing the guardians from space?”

“Right.”

Novosa didn’t look impressed.

“I say diplomacy failed when it blew apart our drones.”

Havoc nodded with feeling.

“Your human shield agrees with you.”

Novosa smiled as she looked past Havoc.

“What a mess.”

There was no malice in Novosa’s voice. Havoc turned to see what she was looking at.

Havoc had insisted on a minimum specification of exploration suit for everyone who planned to exit the shuttle. He and the military types had hard points attached to their skeletons, but most of the other crew didn't or didn't have enough so they wore a harness inside their suit to position them correctly while their suit’s shockgel molded to them. Havoc turned to see Weaver standing in an ill-adjusted and hence ill-fitting harness. He noted a string of beginners' mistakes; over-tightening in one area preventing proper tension in another.

Weaver turned to them at Novosa’s comment. She shook her head and lifted her hands. She didn't look embarrassed, just bemused.

“How should I know?”

Havoc walked forward. Weaver would be wearing the suit for hours and it mattered.

“Do you mind?”

Weaver looked at him expressionless, then shook her head to say,
no, go ahead
.

~    ~    ~

Weaver felt a flutter of trepidation as Havoc walked toward her.

He reached for her, grabbed her waist strap and cinched it tight. She was a little startled as he slid his hands inside it to check the fit. She was standing slightly away from him and he used the waist strap to pull her closer.

He knelt down in front of her and held her in place with the waist strap while he pushed her feet wider apart with his free hand. He reached between her legs, drew through the thigh straps and set about tensioning them correctly. He moved his hands around her thighs deftly and purposefully, working the straps up into place before checking them.

Weaver stared at him with her mouth slightly open, not saying anything. She bit her lip as she flushed. Luckily Havoc didn't notice as he brusquely positioned her harness. Havoc placed one hand on each of her hips and, eyes level with her pelvis, he checked the alignment. He nodded with satisfaction and stood up.

She felt flushed and red. She hoped desperately that her face wouldn’t give her away. He inspected her chest harness and then looked at her with a questioning expression. She stared at him in a peculiar fashion, her mouth still slightly open, and nodded.

He lifted her arms out to the side and took hold of the straps running round her chest. She gave a sharp intake of breath as he slid his hands beneath the strap, his hands digging into the sides of her breasts as he corrected the fit. She gasped again as he ran his hands underneath her breasts, sliding his fingers under the support strap to check the fit.