Battle Station

— 30

Rear Admiral Sarin requested another private meeting less than an hour later. I agreed with reservations, and ignored Sandra’s stern gaze. How could I refuse to meet with her? I needed her ship. Goa had the firepower of three destroyers. The ship’s lasers were larger and longer ranged than anything else I had. Those guns could be instrumental in shooting down incoming enemy missiles, if it came down to that. And I felt pretty strongly that it would.

To counter the threat from the Macros, I ordered all my gunships to show themselves in formation. Groups of five were ordered to fly up and down to the planet at various points, and flying back up again from somewhere else. My forces had to appear to be bigger than they really were in order to give the Macros something to worry about. They liked to fight with overwhelming numerical superiority, and they usually waited until they had the numbers. I wanted to make them think twice before attacking.

Still, I knew this delaying tactic, even if successful, wasn’t going to save my forces in the coming battle. They just had too many factories, and they were building cruisers almost as fast as I built gunships. This was because they had so many more factories than we did. I readjusted my previous estimates, and now figured they had three factories per planet. Four factories must be operating on Eden-9 alone, where the transport had fled with the last facility lifted from Eden-11. Even though it took much longer to build a cruiser than it did a gunship, they had an estimated sixteen factories and I couldn’t face that level of output for long.

My attention naturally turned to the Nano ships, still on station in a mass around Eden-12.

“If we could only get the Nano ships to join us, we could take them out right now,” I said. “Any more successful contacts, Marvin?”

“Nothing new, Colonel Riggs,” Marvin said. “They simply repeat the requirement that we speak with their commanders.”

“How are we supposed to do that? Do they expect me to fly to the gas giant and land on it?”

“Possibly.”

“What is the gravitational pull down there?” I asked.

“About two point five times that of Earth.”

I blinked in surprise. “Why is that? I thought I’d be instantly crushed if I went to a planet with that much mass.”

“This is a common misperception,” Marvin admitted. “The gas giant is over three hundred times the total mass of Earth, but it is far less dense. If it was compressed to a solid ball, it would collapse a human body standing on the surface. The real problem with visitation is its lack of a solid surface. The semi-gaseous, semi-liquid matter that makes up Eden-12 is quite unlike the atmosphere of rocky worlds like Eden-11 or Earth. It is-cloud-like.”

I thought about that. I’d understood these things, but hadn’t thought of such a place in terms of visiting there. I shook my head, was I actually considering taking the Blues up on their nebulous invitation to visit their nebulous homeworld?

“What about temperature? Wind velocities?”

“Colonel Riggs?” Sandra asked, interrupting me.

I looked at her. She gave me a fake, sweet smile. “You aren’t honestly thinking of trying to walk on this hydrogen-methane waterbed, are you?”

“Well, I don’t know. If we could somehow talk them into joining us, it might be worth the risk. Together, our fleets could push the Macros out of this system. I’m sure of it.”

Sandra compressed her lips into a tight line. “Maybe Marvin should do it. He can survive temperatures and levels of pressure a living creature never could.”

Up until this moment, Marvin had been focusing most of his cameras on the various screens and different people’s faces. But at this point I gained four cameras, while Sandra warranted three. I glanced at him, and saw the lenses rotate and zoom. He was trying to catch my expression from many different angles to analyze it.

“That’s not a bad idea,” I said. “It’s a terrible one. Marvin is a machine, and if these biotics trusted machines, they would be dealing with the Macros. Also, no offense Marvin, but I don’t think you are tremendous when it comes to diplomacy.”

Marvin continued to study us quietly. I wasn’t sure if he wanted to go, or didn’t, but I was certain he was interested in the discussion.

“If you go down there, you might not be able to escape the gravity,” Sandra continued stubbornly. “You might drift deeper than you wanted to. You don’t even know where the Blues are! It’s a big world. What if you land in the equivalent of their Sahara Desert?”

“These are all reasonable concerns. But possibly, I could fly out to the system and visit with them via radio at a safe distance from orbit. Their requirements are vague.”

“No, I don’t agree,” Marvin said, suddenly joining the discussion. “I’ve been the translator throughout, and I believe they want to experience you as a physical being.”

“ Experience him?” Sandra asked. “You mean like eat him?”

“Yes, something like that. They are not structurally the same as other biotics. They are not solid individuals. When they meet one another on their world, their forms meld together. Some part of each individuals is left with the other.”

“Oh, this is getting better all the time,” Sandra said. “How would you translate their words if you don’t go down with Kyle?”

“I could do that from higher orbit. I must be allowed aboard the ship at least. I’m afraid the ship and I would count only as machines to the Blues. We are tools to them, not as important as living things.”

“Maybe I could get out of my ship,” I said thoughtfully, “and visit them in my battle suit. It’s like a tiny spaceship, anyway. Do you think that would be good enough for them, Marvin? Do you think they would feel they had- experienced me?”

Sandra’s expression changed from suspicion to alarm. Everyone else on the command crew appeared incredulous. Only Marvin and I were deadly serious. In truth, the idea was growing on me. I’d always wanted to meet with the Blues. I’d wished them harm in the past, but now I simply wanted to understand them. To experience the creatures that had unleashed such robotic hell on their neighboring worlds. Had they done so intentionally or accidentally? Did they even grasp their own guilt?

I recalled the creature that referred to itself as Introspection. When I’d accused it of creating the Macros and Nanos and releasing them upon unsuspecting neighbors, it had finally drifted away. We’d never found it again on Eden-11. Perhaps it had headed out into space, or dissipated into the atmosphere. If I went to talk to its fellows on the gas giant I was sure I would learn something about them, about why and how all of this had happened. The idea that I might learn great truths was magnetic.

Marvin felt it too, I could tell. His burning curiosity to understand the mysteries of the universe around him was unmistakable. Right now, I shared his lust for knowledge. All of this fighting and dying-what was it all about? How had it all started? I wasn’t sure I would get answers from the Blues, but if they didn’t come from that source, we’d probably never learn the truth.

“I think I’m going to try it,” I said thoughtfully.

“But Kyle,” Sandra said. “The temperatures, the pressure-the winds! They move at hundreds of miles per hour. You’ll be frozen and torn apart if you even take off your helmet. You won’t be able to breathe or see anything.”

“I’ve considered those contingencies,” Marvin said suddenly. “I have made preparations.”

Everyone stared at him. What the hell was he talking about? I was immediately suspicious. Was this all part of Marvin’s scheming? I could see it now. He wanted us to come to this conclusion. He’d been very quiet, only inserting various facts at critical points of the conversation. Just how smart was my pet robot? It was time to find out.

“What have you got, Marvin?”

He squirmed a bit before answering. Uncoiling his lower tentacles, he inched closer to me, and I got the impression he wanted to talk in a conspiratorial whisper, but didn’t know how. When he did speak, he’d turned his volume down a notch. It was pointless of course, as everyone in the room was listening closely. I didn’t blame them.

Marvin directed a loop of a small, upper tentacle toward Sandra. “It has been done before. Nothing new. Only this time, there would be controlled input and superior output. I can replicate what has been done-but more than that, I can improve it.”

I eyed him, and glanced at Sandra. She caught on at the same moment I did, I thought.

“Oh no,” she said. “You can forget about that, robot. I don’t want you putting Kyle into some kind of microbial bath. I went through it, and I wish I hadn’t.”

Marvin considered her with a half dozen artificial eyes. “Are you certain of that, Lieutenant? There have been several instances where your new abilities were crucial. I’ve studied the medical records, after-action reports and vids. I believe that in at least two instances Colonel Riggs would have perished if not for your new abilities.”

Sandra had her hands on her hips. She was a sucker for a compliment, but she was suspicious by nature as well. She glared at Marvin. “I’ve saved Kyle at least three times, by my count,” she said. “But that doesn’t mean I want you to make him into some kind of freak like me-or something worse.”

Marvin squirmed and shuffled his coils. His cameras shifted from one face to another, studying us. I tried to count all his cameras-there had to be about fifteen now. He must have added some new ones. More tentacles, too.

“Perhaps we should discuss this command decision privately, Colonel Riggs,” he suggested.

I almost laughed, but one look from Sandra killed that idea. She was in maximum protectiveness-mode now. It was obvious to everyone that Marvin wanted to convince me without her objections getting in the way. She was right about his motives, they were clearly suspicious. Still, his ideas had merit.

“I agree,” I said. “I’ll talk to each of you about this, one at a time, in the conference room. Sandra, you are up first.”

I touched a wall and it melted under my hand. I stepped inside. Sandra followed a moment later, muttering darkly. The moment the smart metal closed out the command center, she was pacing and complaining. Her long, thin arms gestured in broad motions.

“You can’t listen to that crazy machine!” she told me. “I know what it’s like, Kyle. I know I’m a freak, and it bothers me every day. The Microbes will change you forever.”

“We’d be two of a kind.”

She shook her head. “No, I don’t think so. They enhanced me in many ways, but it wasn’t for the purposes of surviving intense cold and pressure. They will do something else to you. You and I will both be unique creatures, unlike the rest of humanity.”

I gazed at her, wondering if she were right. “There’s a lot on the line, Sandra. If I do manage to get the Nano ships to join our fleet, we could chase the Macros out of this system. We are talking about saving several biotic species and six habitable worlds. I’m willing to make some personal sacrifices to save billions of lives.”

She stopped pacing and sat down across from me. She put her head on the table. “I don’t want you to do it. Let someone else turn into a freak. Make it Kwon, or Miklos-or maybe Sloan, I’ve never seen him do anything brave.”

I reached out and touched her hair gently. “I understand how you feel, and I’ll take it into account when I make my decision.”

Sandra looked up at me again. “What about Jasmine?”

“You want me to try to send her?”

She laughed. “I wish. No, I mean you should ask her about this. She should be involved.”

I could see right off where she was headed with this line of reasoning. She knew Jasmine cared about me, and hoped she could convince me not to do it.

“I’ll talk to her about it as well,” I said.

“Good. But don’t do it in a locked room.”

I laughed and kissed her. She pushed back with her lips fiercely, and my mouth burned when we were done. It was a good kind of burn, so I didn’t complain. I sent her out and Marvin came in next.

“Have you made a decision?” he asked.

This surprised me, as I’d been expecting a long, persuasive argument. “Yes,” I said honestly.

“Good. I will go down to the planet surface and prepare the baths. Seven hours should be sufficient. Please be prompt. I will require earthly organics as base materials as well. Six liters of animal matter should be-”

“Marvin,” I interrupted. “I didn’t say I’d decided to do it.”

Marvin swung an extra camera out wide, I suspect to get a profile of me. Maybe this helped him interpret my expression.

“You have not made a clear statement of intent,” he agreed. “But you have decided to do it, haven’t you?”

I sighed. It was disturbing to be outmaneuvered by a highly self-confident robot.

“Yes, I did. How did you know what I would say?”

“I know you rather well by now, Colonel Riggs. I’ve made you the subject of eight distinct studies.”

“Great. Well-all right then. Take what you need and head down to the planet. But be discreet, will you? I’ve not made my choice public yet.”

“I will not reveal anything that may endanger the final outcome.”

He rose, his metal parts scratching and clacking on the deck.

“Just a minute,” I said. “Why do you care so much? Why do you want me to do this?”

“I would think that was obvious.”

“Indulge me.”

“I’m curious, Colonel Riggs. Curious about the Blues, and how far the Microbes can go. I’m as curious about these mysteries as you are. Perhaps even more so. After all, the Blues created my ancestors. Don’t you wonder as to the nature of your own maker?”

“In regards to my own life, I question his reasoning all the time,” I said.

He left then, and I pondered how I got myself into these situations. I suspected Marvin was right in this case. Ever since these ships had come to Earth and devastated our relatively peaceful existence, I’d wanted to know who’d sent them. I’d sworn on the graves of my dead children to learn the truth. Now, if I was lucky, I was going to be able to question the culprits firsthand.