Gliese Chronicles: Thin Margin Ch. 02

"Any questions?" Morgan asked as he scanned the faces at the table.

"When do we go?" Parsons asked.

"As soon as you feel the preparations are complete. The enemy fleet has backed off to the edge of our solar system. We don't know for how long, or if they will attempt to return for this vessel and then continue on to the colonies or not. Time still isn't on our side. So let's move, but be smart about it, we need to be aggressive, but not too aggressive. Remember, we're trying to gather intelligence, not fight a battle," I replied.

I looked at Morgan as he gathered up the images we had used during the meeting. He had made some useful, cogent comments during the meeting that had served to focus attention and instill confidence. I couldn't have asked for more from him, he always managed to make me look good, even when I didn't think I was.

Half an hour later we watched the monitors as space suit-clad robots walked towards the nearest hatch. Our video and audio feeds were strong as we watched as the robots began to inspect the hangar bay walls for access door controls. I was pretty sure power was still operating on the alien ship as we had continued to get signals indicating communication between various ship's systems. It seemed strange in a way, the coding seemed an older version of our own systems. It took about half an hour before an intact doorway was found and opened to the interior, the video feed from the camera's mounted on the spacesuits provided us an excellent view of progress as the robots closed the door, then cycled the doors to gain entry to the interior of the ship.

All the while I watched I was struck by the similarity to how our own ships were engineered. Even the dimensions of the doorways seemed to fit use by creatures of our own stature. Once the interior door opened we had a view of a long, empty corridor with dim lights, suggesting that the alien crew used wavelengths similar to our own to see.

It was as the robots were returning from the bridge that I noticed something near a hatch—it was a symbol in yellow. Our humanoid robot noticed it too and made sure to capture it on camera, then continued to take temperature readings and looking for signs of activity. It was about five minutes later when one of the robots discovered an open door that showed blinking lights inside—it was an access point to their computer systems, including a touch screen that turned on when it was touched.

It was then that the biggest discovery of was all was made—the symbols on the screen were in Late 21 English! I recognized the letters from my history class in school on ancient Earth. There was now no doubt in my mind why the ship's design seemed so familiar, they were basically the same design as our own. Once the robots had gone through the decontamination process we went about reviewing all of the data they had collected, including the video images. This time I made all of the images available to the entire crew so they could have input, making use of all of the talents we had on board. It also resulted in a boost to morale, not a bad thing in my mind.

At this point, we still had far too many questions and not enough answers. How was it this large ship, apparently of Earth design come to be in our solar system and become a threat? Where was the human crew? So far we had not even encountered a robot, though it was clear their systems could be operated by such a crew just as the original New Horizon ship had been when our system was first colonized. It was at this point I decided to take the crew into rotation for rest as we needed to continue to explore the ship with sharp wits about us, then make our way to our fleet where it was tailing the enemy fleet.

"Morgan, I'm going to go to four hours on, eight off, in three shifts for a day to rest the crew. I'm going to get some rest, then I'll relieve you. We need to see if we can gather more intelligence, but I don't think we can delay getting this information to our fleet for much longer."

"I agree Captain. I'll send the robots out again. I think we should see if we can get into their computer system to run a query. If we can find a ship's log we may be able to determine what has happened on board this vessel."

I smiled, Morgan had already arrived at the same conclusions and objectives as myself. I wanted so much to give him a kiss. Instead, I gave him a wink. He nodded to me with a smile and whispered.

"Sweet dreams Captain. I wish I could join you."

I hoped he could tell how much I really would have liked that. A vision of him astride me, my arms wrapped around his neck as he thrust into me filled my mind and a warm feeling of arousal manifested itself. If only we could sneak away for half an hour, that would be enough. I may as well have asked for a week as it was asking too much under existing circumstances.

I listened as the announcement went out for the crew to go to their assigned tasks based upon a three-shift schedule as I walked to my quarters. Once in my room, I removed my boots, pants, and blouse, and fell exhausted into my bunk. I was gone in a matter of minutes. If anything was to happen I was within steps of the bridge and knew Morgan would alert me. His smile was the last thing I remembered as I pulled the blanket up to my chin and closed my eyes.

My alarm went off four hours later. I took a quick shower, put on a fresh uniform, and headed for the bridge after hitting the mess for some food. Once I entered the bridge and received my briefing from Morgan I began to review the new information provided by the crew in their reviews and was surprised to find that Morgan had managed to download a schematic of the enemy vessel from their ship's network. I also found that the symbol outside the heated space indicated a biohazard. At this point, it was unknown what that meant precisely. Morgan had told me the ship's log was being reviewed, but that the Captain's log had been encrypted and efforts to break the encryption had so far been unsuccessful.

I began my review of the ship's log. Morgan had started with the most recent date in the hope of finding what their response had been to our attack. It made sense to me, it was a logical way to proceed. He found the ship's log revealed the exact time of our strikes and the damage that had been inflicted and that it was considered an accident of unknown cause. After the strike on the bridge, control had been automatically shifted to a secondary system buried deep within the ship that was protected from damage.

The most surprising fact was that there had been little effort made to repair the damage to the hangar bay. The hatches had been sealed to secure the interior spaces as close to a breach as possible- a logical, common-sense decision. Our instrument readings indicated the atmosphere was human friendly, having the same composition of gases as that found on our own ships. This was additional proof of human occupation to me, it just didn't seem that this ship was anything other than a human crafted vessel. The question was if it were, where was the human crew? Why had the ships of the 'enemy' fleet attacked us and not responded to our peaceful attempts at contact?

I decided it was time to start at the beginning of the log, from the date of commissioning to operational status. The file was huge and was being uploaded to our own DNA based computer system as rapidly as possible. I had one of the droids start the process of writing a computer program to translate the older terms to our current version of English. I hoped this would ensure we had an accurate record of what had transpired on this vessel. I was now convinced this vessel was of human origin, though possibly a clone of an original right down to all of the software code and programming—this seemed unlikely, but had to be considered just the same.

It was during our second robot survey of other portions of the vessel that our robots met the first inhabitants—humanoid robots similar to themselves. When they met these older droids their attempts to communicate were largely ignored. At this point, we still didn't understand why. Perhaps they only communicated via a central hub that controlled their assignments, making coordination between individuals purely task-based. Of course, perhaps they would respond to a human and ignore the central hub just as our humanoid robots were programmed to do. Humans were always the highest in the command link in our systems and now I wondered if that were the case here too—only on this huge ship humans were not present to direct their actions.

The presence of the biohazard symbols corresponded to a central group of compartments that drew a great deal of energy but were extremely cold. This same symbol had survived use over the centuries as it came over on New Horizon when the colonies were established. It signified 'infectious agents presenting a risk or potential risk to the well-being of man, either directly through his infection or indirectly through disruption of his environment'.

It was a question in need of an answer—if all of the alien vessels contained whatever this vessel held it could pose an additional danger to the colonies. Especially if the destruction of a ship could spread the agent into the atmosphere or survive exposure to deep space around one of our ring colonies orbiting several of the planets in the system. I was hopeful the Captain's log would provide clues, if not an outright explanation, as to what the agent was and how it could impact a human.

I was still reviewing the engineering drawings of the vessel to determine if there was technology onboard beyond their laser weapons that would prove to be something we couldn't defeat in some fashion—either by tactics or electronic jamming of their sensors. The schematics showed lasers designed to remove debris in front of the vessel as it traveled, a form of shield to protect the physical integrity of the hull, and a few along the hull on each side and to the rear for defensive purposes. The addition of lasers for protection was different from what I knew of any of our vessels including New Horizon. It simply had not been needed and notations I found indicated these had been added after departure from Earth orbit, the date on the note was what captured my attention—it was ten years after the departure date of New Horizon for the Gliese system. Where had this ship been over all these years? That represented a span of 57 standard years. This note confirmed for the first time it was a vessel of human design and construction. Our enemy, for whatever reason, was 'us' in a manner of speaking, yet wasn't.

"Captain, there's a message from Space Command, Admiral Prescott, indicating that if we receive this message we should acknowledge and proceed as soon as possible to their position."

"Thank you, Comm."

I decided to wait until Morgan returned to duty before responding. It made sense to bring him up to date on what I had found so we could compare notes. Fifteen minutes later he appeared on the bridge, taking his chair next to mine as we traded smiles.

"You look rested. Ready for an update?"

"I'm good, a full six hours would be better, but it's time to get some of these questions answered. What have you found out since you came on duty?"

I proceeded to brief him and I could tell he was surprised by some of the information. He didn't seem to be surprised by the fact the vessel was human-made. The time since launch was though. Then I told him we were asked to reply to the Admiral and make our way as quickly as possible to the fleet's position, this last produced a frown.

"Captain, I think we need to do one thing before we leave this vessel. I'm not sure you're going to like my suggestion, but it shouldn't take more than an hour to conduct and we can make our best speed to join the fleet afterward."

"Okay Commander, what is it we need to do before we leave?"

"We need to confirm if there are humans on this vessel. I want to enter the biohazard placarded compartments. I think we will find evidence of human occupation there."

I was conflicted, having the robots enter the biohazard area might result in their loss and use for the rest of the mission. On the other hand, these areas represented the only portion of the vessel that had not been inspected closely and it was obviously different. The real question was would it provide any significant new information to help in dealing with the enemy fleet. There really wasn't a way to predict an outcome or its possible significance unless we did it.

"Captain, this is our one opportunity to conduct this investigation in a way that does not jeopardize the rest of our forces, and just a few of ourselves. We know this vessel is secure as we have been all over it and have not encountered a force tasked with repelling us. I can't guarantee a specific result, but I need to make the argument just the same."

"One hour Commander, no more. I'll leave the details to you, it's your mission."

"Thank you, Captain, I'll get Robb and Zenn to go with me."

I shot a look at him. I hadn't expected a human to enter the vessel, especially him. He saw my expression.

"Captain, if our communication fails for some reason inside those compartments I want a pair of human eyes on what we find. This is our one chance to get answers. Don't worry, I don't intend to take unnecessary risks with the robots or myself. I need you to trust me on this."

I lowered my voice to a whisper. "Commander, I do trust you. But I want you back unharmed, in one piece. Now go before I change my mind."

I watched as he left his chair, spoke to Robb, and then watched as they left the bridge together. I let my breath out slowly as I realized for the first time how much I really cared for him. I reminded myself that we both had jobs to do. I knew he had a background in astrobiology and related sciences and that was why he had pushed to conduct the mission himself. I couldn't refuse him as he was the best qualified to conduct the investigation of any crew member onboard Avenger. I hated it when he was right so often and knew how to influence me—he knew how logical engineers were, and I was an engineer.

I watched as Morgan and the two robots left the shuttle bay in their suits and walked to the entry hatch.

"Comm, set the counter for one hour and give the away team a countdown at fifteen-minute intervals."

"Aye, Captain."

I watched the monitor as the group made their way rapidly towards the closest of two hatches to the enclosed compartments. Morgan pushed the control button and the door slid open into an inner chamber with an inner door. The outer door to the corridor closed and a light came on showing the inner door was active, then it slid open and as it did so lights came on revealing the contents of the compartment. I gasped as I recognized what it held, row upon row of cryosleep units, revealing where the human members of the crew were to be found.

I watched as Morgan inspected individual units, some bore yellow biohazard symbols, others bore a plain green circle with a white checkmark. The team continued until they reached another section and then the symbols on the units changed to the yellow biohazard symbol with a red cross. There were less than twenty minutes left before the away team was to return to Avenger. I looked at the monitor for Robb's camera and watched as he plugged a connector from his handheld tablet into a port on a control panel and proceeded to download data from what appeared to be the local hub for the cryogenic compartment. When finished, the away team reversed their route and quickly returned to Avenger, following the decontamination procedures.

Once the away team was back onboard I gave orders taking Avenger out of the hangar bay fully cloaked in passive mode and made for the coordinates provided to reach Admiral Prescott. The fleet lay about four hours away at normal cruise speed, less than two at flank speed which I ordered immediately. That would give us at least an hour to review the latest information we had gathered and draw preliminary conclusions to share with the Admiral upon arrival. There was no reason to believe the remaining ships wouldn't engage in hostile actions as before and keeping Avenger's presence seemed a reasonable precaution. After all, so far we had proven to be the best deterrent to their advancement.

I was sure our finding of humans on board would shock the Admiral and his staff, it surely had surprised us despite the fact we had clues before actually finding the cryo-sleeping human crew. Sobering was the fact, that in all likelihood, far too many of the humans in cryogenic sleep would never wake as they were already dead—we simply didn't know why.

Morgan returned to sit in his chair, his face somber as he looked at me. "Those people have been in there a long time. I'm pretty sure those with the yellow biohazard with a red cross were dead, from what I could see they looked somewhat emaciated. As if they had been ill previously. All of the others looked in much better shape, those with green symbols appeared to be normal in terms of body condition."

"So there were no visible signs of injury or trauma?"

"None I could detect from outside the unit. I hope we can get confirmation of what the symbols mean when Robb uploads the data from their local hub into our system. Whatever happened must have taken them by surprise and they didn't have time to fight it."

"Did you see anything else that would be useful?"

"Yes, I think so. At the far end of the compartment was a long line of robots in charging stations. We didn't get too close due to time constraints, but I suspect they were plugged in to maintain their neural networks, but otherwise weren't active."

"Morgan, do you think they were operating with a minimal robot crew at the time we hit them?"

"Yes, I think that explains why they hadn't undertaken major repairs, only repairs that were required to maintain the integrity of the human-occupied compartments and circuits to ensure the ship's engines and other energy sources continued to function. They prioritized their available resources to keep the human cargo intact. At least that's my guess."

That conclusion seemed the most logical conclusion. Past events seemed to support that theory, even the destruction of our ships if they were deemed a threat to their own human population. There were obvious questions to be answered. At least now, we seemed to be getting somewhere.

"Good work, Commander, I think we need to get the Captain's log and ships log in shape to run some queries. The answers have to be in those records, there has to be a logical explanation for all of this."

I saw the expression on his face and knew what he was thinking. I smiled. "Yeah, I know. I think like an engineer."

He grew a wide grin, then whispered as he leaned towards me. "No, you sound like an intelligent woman."

Just then I saw a message come up on my console screen. It was from Zenn and pertained to the uploaded information from the cryogenic compartment. I saw it was copied to Morgan as well and when I finished reading it I looked at him knowing it wasn't good news as I heard his voice.

"Nearly seventy percent mortality, twenty percent affected, and ten percent unaffected. No wonder they all went into the cryogenic units. There was nowhere else for them to go to survive."

"What the hell did this to them?" I asked, knowing we still didn't have an answer.

"Something that came on fast and they weren't equipped to handle. I hope we haven't just killed ourselves by going into that ship."

Those words sent a chill down my spine. There were only a few things that would devastate an entire crew like that, and the absence of external trauma seemed to eliminate one of them completely—a psychological break that affected the crew in a matter of hours or days. Another possibility, collision with a large object that depressurized major portions of the hull also seemed unlikely as there wasn't any indication of major damage, other than our own, to their ship. Of course, it could have been repaired, but there wasn't any sign of that either. I didn't like what remained of the most viable explanations.