Sol (The Silver Ships Book 5) (43 page)
Read Sol (The Silver Ships Book 5) Online
Authors: S. H. Jucha
Alex leaned back in his chair and stared up at the overhead while he thought.
Alex replied. Finally, Alex focused on Terese, who he could see tensing up. “There are some conditions.” The moment Alex said that, smiles went around the room.
“First,” Alex began, “the manufacturing site does not leave this station. Second, Haraken personnel do not leave Idona Station or the nearby space, if local travel is required. By extension, all UE medical personnel, who will be responsible for distributing and administering the nanites, will be trained at Idona Station.”
“Mr. President,” said Reiko, “I have Admiral Chong’s word that my cruiser command will be permanently stationed at Idona as long as the Harakens are here. It would be my job and my honor to protect your people and this station.”
Alex nodded to Reiko, hearing the strong commitment behind her words.
“Let’s continue with the conditions,” Alex said, eyeing Z. “The GEN machines do not leave Idona Station under any circumstances until they leave with you as you exit this system. In fact, they do not leave our people’s care at any time. Furthermore, Z, you are to ensure that if the machines are tampered with they will permanently disable themselves. If and when you determine this has happened, the job of medical nanites manufacturing will be considered concluded and all of you will pack up and come home. Am I understood?” Alex waited for everyone’s nod of agreement, especially that of Terese.
Looking at Captain Cordova, Alex asked, “Is this why you’re here, Captain?”
“Yes, Ser President, I will ensure our people get home safely, and I would not wish to miss another adventure,” he added, a youthful smile lighting up the aged face.
“Then the
Rêveur
remains at Idona,” Alex said. “It’s here, Captain, for our people’s safe return and not for touring the solar system.”
“Understood, Ser President,” the captain replied, knowing Alex’s words were meant for many at the table.
About this time, a rushed Franz Cohen hurried into the meeting.
“Ah, Commander, I was waiting for someone to show up about now,” Alex said, and he eyed Terese, who took the opportunity to shrug her shoulders in Alex’s inimitable style and then let loose her own trademark laugh.
“Let me anticipate your request, Commander,” Alex continued. “Yes, you may stay, and four travelers will be at your disposal. I presume you’ve selected your pilots?”
“Yes, Mr. President,” Franz replied, “I was waiting to request permission of Commodore Reynard for three other pilots and me, if you approved Ser Lechaux’s request. Am I premature?”
“No, Commander, I think we are in the negotiations stage. And you, Ser Station Director, what is your role in this plot?” Alex asked Nikki.
“Ostensibly, Mr. President, it’s to provide assurance that Idona Station will provide a manufacturing base for the Haraken medical nanites at no charge. However, the thought that some of your people might be outmaneuvering you made it impossible to stay away.” Nikki punctuated her last sentence with a cheeky smile.
“Rebel,” Alex grumbled. “Mickey, you have your flight crew picked? Captain, you have your crew?” In both cases Alex received a nod of acknowledgment.
“So you believe you have it all covered?” Alex said to the room. His question was greeted by satisfied smiles, which slowly waned in the face of Alex’s own smile. He waited, knowing implant comms were burning with questions and reviews of checklists.
“So what did we miss, oh great one?” Terese asked grudgingly.
Alex looked over at the twins, who nodded to him without his asking the question. “Which troopers were asked to stay to provide security?” A short round of expletives greeted his question. “Étienne and Alain have volunteered to stay to manage security, and I’ll have Tatia request volunteers,” Alex said. “You people and the GEN machines are to have around-the-chronometer protection. Now let’s talk about how long this might take.”
The meeting dissolved into the minutiae of UE medical personnel travel, manufacturing, training, and other assorted details. When Alex got ready to leave, he put a hand on Franz’s shoulder and whispered, “Let me know how Reiko likes her first turn in the cockpit of one of our travelers, Commander.”
“Certainly, Mr. President,” Franz agreed, embarrassed at being so easily read.
* * *
Renée took a moment to talk to Reiko before she left the meeting.
“I hear that Franz asked you to return to Haraken with him when he leaves.” Renée said.
“Not much privacy among your people,” Reiko replied, but the wry smile she offered was meant to take the sting out of her remark. “Yes, he did,” she finally admitted. “But, I was serious when I said I wanted this cruiser command to protect this station and your people. It’s important to me.
“And your commitment is appreciated, Reiko,” Renée replied. “I know Alex can think of no one else he would choose to trust the welfare of his people to than you.”
“I did tell Franz that there’s the possibility of getting a ride on the
Rêveur
when he returns home, but I also said that I wanted a guarantee of a ride back to Sol if things didn’t work out on Haraken,” Reiko said and laughed self-consciously at her words. The idea of leaving with Franz excited and scared her and probably in equal amounts, if she was honest with herself.
“We’ll see you within the year, Reiko,” Renée said, giving the commodore a quick hug.
“You seem sure of your opinion,” Reiko called after Renée.
“Oh, I am. There is a sort of adventuresome woman, who finds a certain type of New Terran male irresistible,” Renée said, adding a conspiratorial wink.
Reiko cracked up, laughing at the thought that the alluring Ser de Guirnon, partner of the president of an alien world, and she might have similar personalities.
* * *
Terese and the Harakens who were supporting her efforts would spend the greater part of the next year at Idona. The Haraken probes made it possible to get the call out to everyone immediately, but a lengthy time was needed to allow the medical teams to journey from the farthest rim across the solar system.
If it weren’t for the tremendous impression Haraken technology already made on the people of Sol, the visiting UE medical personnel wouldn’t have believed the instructions they were receiving. The administration of the medical nanites was simple. More difficult was the pre- and post-surgical procedures required if the individual had artificial material in the body, such as metal implants in the bone. That material would need to be removed before the initial injection, and the patient maintained in a stable position until the nanites repaired the body.
The objections from the doctors were always the same. “We don’t have room to hospitalize our population for long periods of time.” The answers were always the same. “The period we are discussing is at most several hours for the more radical operations, provided nutrients and fluids are immediately supplemented.
It was an important item stressed over and over in training — the need for superior nutrition. The body would require tremendous amounts of calories and nutrients. This would be especially true for those who had been restricted to poor diets, such as the rebels and those people serving life sentences in the corporate and government factories.
Supply of the medical nanites would represent a huge boon for the station. Miners were kept busy procuring the exotic raw minerals Z required, and the station’s sleepovers, restaurants, and shops were constantly filled by medical teams and, of course, visitors, who were anxious for a sight of the Harakens before they left the system.
Terese became a notable personality for her efforts, and it wasn’t long before she realized why Alex preferred not to attract public attention. But for Idona’s visitors, if Terese wasn’t available, a look at the exotic twins or heavy-worlders, such as Franz, was always worth the trip.
Scientists from outer-rim locations made the trip to the station to speak with Z, who good-naturedly entertained their questions. The influence of the Miranda persona did much to balance Z’s replies to their more awkward questions. Most went away shaking their heads in awe. They expected some sort of indication of robotics or hybridization, but after hours of conversation, they couldn’t detect anything but human physiology and responses. Some even suggested that Z might be just an incredibly large heavy-worlder. At which point, Z would often smile and say, “But that’s the purpose of any SADE human avatar, Sers, to have it appear indistinguishable from its intended purpose.”
Idona was inundated by the arrival of so many liners that docks were often unavailable, necessitating the use of shuttles to transport passengers to and from the station. It was not long before Nikki Fowler was able to realize the dream of her great-grandfather, whom she never met. She would have the credits to expand the station.
The great gift Nikki received, although not the one she expected, started with a long conversation with Mickey and Z, who after listening to her ideas volunteered to design the expansion. Nikki spent hours talking about how she thought it should function and appear.
One day when Nikki was asked by Mickey and Z to join them, Nikki anticipated attending another planning session. In Alex’s old planning room, their design slowly revolved in the holo-vid left behind for Z’s use. Nikki was upset that apparently her suggestions were ignored, but the engineer in her began studying the design, and she began asking questions.
As Nikki was nodding her approval of their achievement, elegant solutions beyond her capabilities, her final question became, “This is nice and all, but can UE technology build this?” When they told her that the detailed plans using UE technology were on her servers under the title, “Nikki’s Dream,” she hugged both of them.
The leaves of the collector closed around a group of crystals surrounding the brightest and tallest of the specimens. The robotic explorer retracted the collector, tucked it into its rear end, and started working its way back to the moon’s surface. Time was of the essence. The moon, in its elliptical orbit, was making a near approach to the planet, and tidal forces would begin disrupting its surface.
Already the cylindrical explorer was halting, extending its burrowing arms, spinning them at high speed, and reopening the pathway back to the surface, which was slowly closing from the shifting surface.
Sitting on the moon’s surface, three miners, Stremski, Willard, and Lister, were pacing, sweating, and swearing. Their explorer was struggling to reach the surface, and if it failed to reach them in time, they would have to abandon it and the prizes it held in its collector.
The men specialized in locating unusual mineral formations and were exploring deep inside a moon of metal ores covered by a thick layer of frozen gases. It was a risky venture, but Lister had a feeling, and Lister’s intuition was the team’s good luck charm.
Deep crevices in the surface were expanding toward the mining cab when the robot popped up not 200 meters away, having chosen an alternate pathway up. Slapping one another on the back, Stremski piloted the cab over to their exploration tool, Willard snatched it up, and Lister employed the comm to ready their ship, which was maintaining a geosynchronous orbit above their cab.
Once aboard, the men locked down the cab in the ship’s bay, unloaded the collector, and hurried to exit the space, ridding themselves of the planet’s increasing gravitational forces.
Stremski and Willard were in the pilot’s cockpit when Lister yelled to them on the comm. Locking in the autopilot, they hurried back to the specimen analyses room where Lister was examining the robot’s last collection. They piled into each other in front of Lister, who was wearing an extraordinary grin in what was normally a taciturn face and holding up an enormous crystal column, a beautiful specimen exhibiting a delicate blend of pinkish orange light.
“It can’t be,” said Stremski, staring at the 30-plus centimeter long specimen. “Is it a pad?” he asked, referring to the ultra-rare padparadscha sapphire.
“That big? It can’t be,” said Willard.
“Spec machine says it is, boys,” replied Lister. That his heavily lined face was still wearing a broad grin convinced the others of what he was saying, and a victory dance by Stremski and Willard proceeded to pound worn boots into the ship’s aging deck.
When the two men stopped dancing, having run out of breath quite quickly, Lister deadpanned, “You two done yet?” He waited a couple of heartbeats and broke into another ear-splitting grin before he asked, “You want to see what else we got?”
Days later, Stremski, Willard, and Lister marched into Nikki’s office and placed the cleaned, brilliant, crystal column on her desk.
Patrice regarded the exquisite crystal and said, “Happy birthday, Nikki!”
“It’s gorgeous,” Nikki replied, “but it’s not my birthday.”
“It’s a pad,” Stremski said, beaming. “A rare pink-orange sapphire … a padparadscha,” he plowed on when Nikki and Patrice only stared at him. “It’s worth hundreds of millions of credits.”
“Congratulations on your find, men, are you looking for us to protect it for you until you find a buyer?” Patrice asked.
“It’s not for us,” Willard said excitedly. “It’s for Idona … for the people of the station, the miners, the captains, the crews … everyone in this rim space.”
“Perhaps, I’m a little slow today,” Nikki said, dropping back into her chair. The Haraken president had left her a gift, a nanites chair, and she couldn’t resist enjoying it every opportunity she got. “Explain this from the beginning.”
“It’s like this,” Lister said. “All three of our families were on this station when Portland, may he find torment wherever he is, tried to demolish it. Everyone in this rim space pitched in to help the Harakens … and we won.”
“Okay, all true … and this ties into your magnificent crystal, how?” Nikki asked.