Retribution (The Federation Reborn Book 3) (7 page)

Lieutenant Commander Angus Standish had been working on the Malekian problem for the past twelve years just as she'd been working on the Ssilli problem. He'd had a shipboard assignment so he couldn't oversee the work done by students, nor guide their efforts so her project had raced ahead … for a time.

He'd cheated though. He'd enlisted Doctor Harvest and others to help him. They'd been amused by the sideline project, and it hadn't progressed well, at least not initially. Then Doctor Standish had passed through and dumped a couple terabytes of data in their lap, enough to kick-start things all over again.

And of course the admiral's find on Lemnos had also kick-started the Resurrection project into high gear. He'd found no less than six other species that had been thought to have been extinct on the station, which meant the Resurrection team had suddenly garnered new attention and resources, enough to make more progress. And under the watchful eyes of the media, they were also under pressure to perform.

Doctor Standish and Doctor Harvest had been the first to succeed. They'd cloned the Malekian lieutenant and gestated eggs that had been brought successfully to term last year. But that had sparked a problem. Her lips pursed in a small frustrated smile.

Apparently they were learning new things every day. The Malekians for instance—they had three sexes and required each to reproduce. Angus and Harvest had tried to secure the lieutenant's permission to engineer the Malekian 2.0 as a binary race, but the lieutenant had balked. So, to show some progress after a decade of lackluster theoretical work, they'd initiated the cloned brood.

And therein, they'd hatched a host of new problems—imprinting for one. Malekians imprinted on the first being they saw like a Terran bird, gator or crocodile, and that had been a hapless Neochimp janitor working nights to help pay his college tuition.

So, the confused pink and green fuzzy hatchlings had been listless unless the janitor came around. It had taken two days and the loss of half the brood before they'd found the problem and drafted the janitor to help. That had gotten the remaining hatchlings to eat.

But that had been only the first hurdle. The second had come when they'd delved deeper into how the sexes were generated. Like some species of Terran birds, amphibians and fish, the Malekians could alter their gender during molt. It was driven by complex pheromones and exposure to environmental factors. Those environmental factors could be a problem she thought, tapping her lips with her fingers as she rocked gently in her chair.

Every hatchling was born as a neuter. They'd been pleased by that. The neuter was the mixing bowl of the species; it took the eggs from the female, the sperm from the males, mixed them with its own secretions, and that allowed the sperm to penetrate the eggs. From there the eggs had been sometimes transferred back to the female to carry to term. Within, the female hormones and temperature would mix with the growing eggs until she laid them.

Those were all complex problems. But the environment, temperature, light and apparently gender mixes of those around the hatchlings drove their tiny little brains to go through puberty in different ways. If they were in a mixed group of male female, they stayed neuter. If they were in a group of males, they became female. If they were in a group of females, they became a cock, a male. Then there was the third possibility, one they hadn't anticipated. If they were in a group of neuters they stayed neuter.

And apparently other species didn't count in their great puberty molt. So, in a couple of years they were going to have their hands full.

At least they had a couple of years to find a fix to the problem she thought. And the Malekian chicks had a nice world of Agnosta with plenty of gruff Marines to watch over them on … as long as they kept from falling off high places or getting picked off by birds of prey! She shook her head. The netting there would help she thought.

Her thoughts turned to her own project. Her problem with the Ssilli was more horridly complex. She'd nearly lost Commander, she paused then grimaced, now Captain JG Nata'roka during their first all-natural breeding attempt. Everything had been going fine; they'd fussed over the expectant mother and monitored her carefully. But when she passed her normal due date, they'd known something was wrong.

It wasn't until they performed a check and found that the eggs had died and were rotting within her that the elderly Ssilli had remembered that the light of the moon triggered her optic nerve and her brain to trigger egg laying. It had to be a specific light level and frequency too.

After she'd recovered they'd had to wait to try again. While they'd waited engineers had created a VR experience to trigger the labor and birthing process in the Ssilli female. Their previous two attempts had failed, but this newest was the most promising. They'd had some problems with natural predators but the Ssilli insisted on using the birthing coves that the engineers had created for them. The eggs had hatched and were now larva in their first stage of molt.

But they were so fragile. Salinity was a problem, light, food; they were initially cannibalistic with siblings smaller than themselves … the list went on and on. Every day she dreaded the morning report. It was becoming normal to see at least a small tithe had died in the night. Then she'd have to sick an intern or someone to find a reason why.

And sometimes they didn't have any reasons to give her.

It was a maddening process; one she hated but knew would be the most rewarding. And with the genetic material from these two bodies … they were almost as important as where they'd come from, she knew that.

Whatever came over their discovery, it was vital that the bodies be preserved. With them, the two living Ssilli, and the genetic changes she'd concocted from the Encyclopedia Galactica, they had more than a fair chance of resurrecting the species from the brink of extinction.

If they even needed it. With two more … she frowned. She wasn't sure and kept scolding herself to not get her hopes up. But …

Haste had to be made but tempered with knowledge. She needed to get someone moving on the project before the bodies decayed too far. One had already decayed for what was a long time. According to the reports, the enemy had frozen it in its tank. She wasn't sure how deep the ice crystals had reached. They might get lucky if they kept it at the right temperature and inserted probes to try to extract tissue samples.

She frowned as she tapped out the request. She flagged it with a priority code and then sent it off into the electronic universe to eventually wing its way to its intended destination.

It sucked that the ships that had found and captured the derelict were frigates. That meant neither had a dedicated doctor on board. A frigate was no place for a fully-fledged doctor; paramedics were good enough for day-to-day problems. If it became too serious, the ship was supposed to offload the sick or injured crew member at the nearest port.

She frowned, playing with her lower lip. She was hesitant to tell the Ssilli. She didn't want to get their hopes up or depress them.

Finally, she broke down and made the call. Her lips twisted as the dumb A.I. running the electronic exchange checked to see if the subjects were available and willing to talk over a vid chat. Apparently she wasn't a coward after all, she thought nervously right up until the Ssilli faces appeared on the split screen.

“Captain, Commander, good to see both of you.”

“And you as well, Doctor. You have news?”

“Not the news you were expecting.” She went on to relate what she'd learned of the events in Nightingale and of the capture of
Marengo
. She finished by telling them of the Ssilli bodies found on board.

The reaction from Captain JG Nata'roka and Lieutenant Commander Tra'l were subdued, at least initially. Then the younger male erupted in a riot of colors as his skin reacted to his burgeoning emotional state. If the colors were any indication, hope and excitement were primary among them.

“It is wonderful news, Doctor, that members of our species have also survived …,” the commander said. “It is a miracle.”

“We don't know if they are natural or not. We won't know until the autopsies are complete and ONI gets its hands on the databases. It'll probably be months. But it certainly is encouraging … in a dark way I suppose.”

“Oh? Oh, you mean because they died? Yes, that is harsh. But better to die free, to die being found rather than be a slave, Doctor, to be free,” Nata'roka said ever so softly. Her virtual image bobbed in the pickup field of the camera. There was a bit of a blur as she moved her tentacles about. “Trust me on this.”

“I do, Captain. I just wish our people would have gotten to them in time—if not in time to save the first, then the male,” Nara said.

“They did their best. I know it sucks to die in a ship loosing atmosphere,” the commander said. “He held out as long as he could.”

“Thank you for understanding.”

“Based on what I've read from the report on the ship, she tried to bluff her way past the picket in Nightingale not knowing it was ours or … I don't know. The frigates stopped her when she tried to run, from what I've read, I'll upload the report to you. The frigates had to fire on the ship to disable her engines to keep her from running. Her surviving crew scrubbed her files and navigational database; from what we're learning, that was done in advance though. I'm assuming the crew tried to hide where they found the Ssilli. From the report the Ssilli female had been dead for some time; her tank had been frozen.”

“I see,” the commander murmured.

“You should know, the male Ssilli did something or the crew decided to expend him rather than use him as a bargaining chip. We don't know. They cut off his life support.”

“So it wasn't the navy's fault?”

“No, no it wasn't.”

“The pirates.”

“Yes, it seems that way. With the computers purged, we don't know where the ship has come from so we can't be sure where they got the Ssilli from. But we do know they are out there. That's half the battle. Now we just need to narrow down where.”

“Agreed, Doctor. That some of our people survived, despite the odds …,” the captain murmured. “We will continue though.”

“Of course. The navy will look for them.”

“Good.”

“And hopefully find some still alive,” Doctor Thornby stated.

“That too.”

“Thank you for doing what you can, Doctor. Even though it now seems in vain, thank you,” the captain said, cutting the circuit from her end. After a moment her partner did as well.

:::{)(}:::

Ship Captain and newly promoted Lieutenant Commander Oscar Levninson of the
Horseshoe Crab
class frigate
Descartes
contemplated the future as his overworked and overtired crew did their duty.

He'd had one spot of good news over the entire mess and virtual exile in Nightingale. Sure he was bagging kills, though that one he would have liked to have avoided. But he'd also come to realize that the admiral appreciated his effort and the sacrifices he and his crew were enduring, hence, his most recent ansible letter from the admiral as well as a promotion to Lieutenant Commander.

He knew he was still going to have to face a review board for his actions and decision tree when he got back to Pyrax, but that was a headache for a later time. For now, they had a mission to complete.

The two ships had spent the better part of a week towing the derelict freighter to a polar orbit around the planet. All the while a couple of volunteers had done their best to keep minimum life support functioning in the compartment where the Ssilli tank was so it wouldn't freeze and destroy the specimen.

They'd been a bit fortunate for someone on the planet to restore a shuttle. Lynbergh Enterprises, he thought with a sniff. The engineers of both ships had consulted over the radio to help the project along, initially to help move freight and out of boredom, but then as the project progressed to flight status, for the promised free rides.

He'd been amused to find out that the original purpose had been intended to move cargo and people from continent to continent. Hops it was called. When the shuttle had been flight certified as air worthy, then flight tested, he'd managed to use the federation credits as well as some bartering to cajole the shuttle owner into doing occasional hops to pick up personnel for some much-needed groundside liberty as well as transfer some very much needed supplies. Of course the engineers had been involved … and that was when they'd seen mister Nail Lynbergh's true mercenary colors.

Free rides indeed. Free
ride
. Ride singular and he
charged
for the fuel used and the air they breathed. They'd naturally backed off follow-up consult work after he'd given them his bill.

Now Mister Lynbergh had his shuttle waiting with a pair of doctors and another set of fisherman who'd been hired for the grim task of dissecting the dead Ssilli. He'd warned the captain that he charged by the hour. He wasn't kidding so they were planning to kick him loose as fast as they could. The man made his credits moving things quickly and efficiently.

One thing that had apparently mollified the man was paying him in part with salvaged goods and equipment from the derelict. A small work party was with him picking through for the choice bits he could fit in his cramped cargo bay. From the sound of it, the man intended to get as much as he could out of it.