Fundamental Force Episode One Page 4

  5

  Coming out onto the doorstep of his house, Space Fleet Commander General MacQueen stopped for a moment, taking deep breaths of the cool moisture-laden morning air. At this early hour, when the Sun had not yet even risen above the horizon, everything around was covered in cold wet dew. In such weather, the organism of any warm-blooded animal opposes with all its being the idea of leaving a warm dry dwelling and poking its nose into the street.

  In cold damp weather, the amount of energy expended on maintaining the body at optimum temperature rises sharply, which is why, recalling many millions of years of evolutionary experience, every cell of MacQueen’s organism was urging him to change his mind and go back to bed.

  Time served in the Special Space Service kills off sensitivity to such weaknesses of one’s own fragile shell once and for all. At first, effort is required to force these weaknesses into the remotest corner of the consciousness, to prevent them influencing behavior, but over time this becomes second nature. In the whole Solar System, the last thing to whose complaints the general was prepared to listen and give way was his own body. Having made several circular motions with his arms to relax his shoulder joints, still sluggish with sleep, he stepped onto the asphalt path in front of the house towards the invigorating cold. At first his steps were slow, but he gradually speeded up. A little faster still and MacQueen was running.

  Twelve kilometers stretched out ahead of him, after which he would return invigorated and with a clear head. His sleepiness and inertia would leave him, and his brain would begin to work rapidly and efficiently. This state of vigor and filling the organism with vital force was why every day, before anyone else in the district, he left his warm bed and submitted his body to the cool of the morning, or to cold rain and wind.

  Over the past forty years, the general had not missed a single morning run, no matter where he was, whether in a space ship in the open cosmos, an orbital station or another planet of the Solar System.

  At one time, he had been quite different. Having grown up in an ordinary, unremarkable family, like billions of others on his home planet Earth, he had not had any kind of special abilities or iron will that had distinguished him from his peers. The parents of several of his acquaintances had had their own small shops and their children had had to help them in their work from an early age, but MacQueen was not among those who had learned the burden of hard work from childhood.

  Nor had he suffered any deprivations. His family had not been rich, but he had never been short of the basic necessities, even if he had not been able to permit himself anything special. Life had not been sweet, but need had not made it bitter either. By the time he left school, the future general was among those whom most teachers would describe as a lazy kind of lad. They didn’t spare the jokes when they learned he was preparing for the Special Space Service entrance exams. In the eyes of the average Joe, in what they called popular culture, the typical SSS soldier was stupid, but hard as iron. The diametrical opposite of the young MacQueen, whose sharp mind fitted comfortably in a spoiled body.

  Looking back, it must be admitted that they were partly right. The SSS seemed much less suited to him than studying in some university. The comfortable seats of an academic auditorium were closer to his nature, he believed, than physical deprivation and regular mortal danger outside assimilated space. Nevertheless, though he had had some doubts about his choice of profession at first, they were finally dispersed by his resentment of the jokes of those around him who considered him a spoiled brat.

  Once in the SSS, he was initially haunted by the thought that he had sold his soul. The space fleet took all of him, including the buttons on his shirt and the laces in his shoes. Whereas the colleges that people normally went to on leaving school filled only part of their time, the Fleet permitted no such indulgence. It avidly took up all of his time, apart from a few free minutes before sleep.

  He found it hard, just like all the others. But after a few months, once his body was in good shape, MacQueen suddenly realized that his personality had somehow thrown off its rough scale and rusty crust, laying bare a core of sterner stuff. His service changed something in him for the better, and this in itself began to bring him satisfaction. He liked what was happening to him, how the harmful impurities of laziness and indecisiveness were being sweated out of him, leaving a pure residue of an unknown but unusually strong material.

  In the combat simulator, his platoon started as a disorganized mob, but suddenly an internal structure took shape in this random group of rookies. They began to understand each other from half a word, half a look, and the chain of command ended with MacQueen of its own accord.

  The sergeant yelling at them was no longer yelling at all of them, but mainly at him, when they did not manage to take cover from the virtual fire of the holographic enemy in the close corridors of the simulator. When the platoon failed to complete a combat mission, it became MacQueen’s fault. They began looking at him as a leader long before he was officially promoted to powers of command.

  And that was how he realized that the SSS was his calling. To the astonishment of all who had known him as a civilian, and to his own even greater astonishment, the SSS proved to be the element that had been lacking in him, the catalyst of his personality, without which he would have remained an ordinary clerk, lawyer or shopkeeper just like all the others.

  He had now covered half his jogging route. MacQueen left the city and ran through the morning forest. The air gradually became filled with the songs of awakening birds and the upper edge of the Sun peeped over the distant mountains, hidden from sight by the trees. His time to be alone with his thoughts had passed and he would now be inundated with calls. Although he had personal secretaries to sort the unimportant from the important without mercy, it was not much help. As commander of the space fleet, the mightiest force in the Solar System, there was so much coming in every second that he had to be on the line continuously.

  The watch on his wrist vibrated. This was the first call to get through.

  “Good morning, general. Have you heard the news?” It was Shelby’s voice.

  Their first conversation had taken place five years ago, when an alien ship crossed the boundary of the Solar System for the first time. The team of this droll professor, the dean of the astrophysics faculty, had been the first people on Earth to set eyes on the strange flight trajectory of the alien craft. It was still far beyond the orbit of Neptune at the time.

  “Good morning, professor. What news, exactly?”

  “The president spoke about the SM openly on the air yesterday.”

  “Well, it had to become known to the public sooner or later.”

  “I am amazed by your calmness.”

  MacQueen just smiled sadly. It was easy to observe an actual battle in space and take note of the losses of one’s own ships with an indifferent appearance. Unlike many of his secretaries however, who had seen such clashes only on a computer screen, he had actual combat experience and knew very well what a direct hit from a ship’s gun or missile meant.

  Images of an explosion wave spreading through the compartments of a damaged ship passed before his eyes, how the eardrums and lungs of those unfortunate enough to be inside burst, how the blood flowed from their mouths and ears. In a flash, an unsealed ship loses its atmosphere to space, allowing the cosmic vacuum in. To be in space at such a moment with no protective spacesuit, mouth gaping like a fish pulled ashore and without the strength to fill the lungs with air, was the worst nightmare of all those who served in the SSS. Suffocation was a terrible death.

  The objective laws of battle cannot be changed, however. This element is not under human control, so it is easy to maintain a professional calm at such losses, however awful they might be. But when the most important link in the command chain permits himself to blurt out matters of the highest secrecy as if it were just some sort of gossip, endangering the mission and the lives of many people, then this really made the general furious.

  But
there was no sense in crying over spilt milk. What was done was done. Rage should not be allowed to enter the soul or it will eat away at the consciousness from the inside, giving rise to a fury that clouds common sense.

  “It had to become public knowledge sooner or later,” answered MacQueen laconically. “It’s my job to safeguard the mission and leave emotion to the politicians. Hot air is their prerogative.”

  “In that case, we shall have to plan the technical parameters of entry all over again.”

  “I’ll order a ship to be sent for you.”

  6

  “This way please, Mr. LeRoy...”

  Swinging her hips coquettishly, the shapely secretary led the president’s advisor along the corridor. Her markedly business-like appearance and slightly cold attitude did not fully conceal her flirtatious inclinations.

  A position high up in the hierarchy is always an attraction for women. The president’s chief advisor, despite his unsightly looks and dwarf-like height, was a prime example of this.

  While studying at school and then at university, he became accustomed to being totally deprived of attention from the opposite sex. His first job upon graduating had taken his bank account well into the black. His hopeless poverty was gradually lost in the mists of the past, however, and the subsequent success of his career sent the mocking glances from women the same way. He suddenly became interesting to those who had previously looked down on him.

  They say that for people like him, career success in some way compensates for an inferiority complex. Maybe so, but he wasn’t bothered about that. The main thing was that it worked, enabling him to obtain in excess that which he had previously lacked. The rest of it didn’t matter.

  They reached a closed door at the very end of the corridor. The secretary pressed her finger to the electronic lock, which clicked loudly as soon as her finger passed over its biometric scanner, unlocking the door. LeRoy looked around the sparse furnishing of the corridor. “It’s rather gloomy here, isn’t it?”

  The secretary turned her head towards him more sharply than usual, playfully showing off her thick head of hair braided into a pitch-black plait, and giggled guiltily.

  “You don’t say! It clearly lacks a woman’s touch. But sessions aren’t often held here. Usually...” She broke off after noticing someone at the other end of the corridor and immediately put a serious expression on her face.

  Not bothering to take even a brief glance towards what had so frightened her, LeRoy stepped into the room and, ignoring the customary behavior expected of guests, flopped down in the chair at the head of the table. He put his hand in his pocket, got out a small object and set it down on the table in front of him.

  Half a minute later there was the sound of approaching steps. Three people in smart business suits entered the cramped room. LeRoy, sprawling languidly in his chair, did not think it necessary to stand up and greet them or shake hands.

  Showing no surprise at such disrespect, they sat a little further along the table. Two of them were taller than the third, who was the oldest. To a trained eye, their subordination to him was obvious. In spite of their height, they looked up to him and he behaved as one would expect of the leader of a herd, appearing almost indifferent.

  “Well, Mr. LeRoy, it seems to me that our job has become a lot easier,” began the tallest of the three, who appeared to be the lowest in rank.

  “Why is that?”

  “We still need to cooperate, of course, but...” cut in the other one, then stopped significantly.

  LeRoy nodded approvingly and, maintaining his usual smile, lifted the small object from the table. It proved to be a holographic cube. With an exaggerated basketball-throwing movement, he put it in a black briefcase standing open by the table leg. It could be heard striking the leather interior of the briefcase a few times as it came to rest.

  “I think you’re right, we won’t need this...”

  His opponents, instantly becoming animated, made calming gestures.

  “No, no, of course not...” said the leader, no longer with any trace of arrogance. “Without your invaluable help, we would not have had the faintest idea of how to proceed with the project. Please, Mr. LeRoy...”

  LeRoy looked at them across the table.

  “With your permission, I’ll get down to business. So, the entry parameters will be changed. We don’t yet know exactly how, work on that is going on right now. There are several proposals, but the president will only have the exact information on his desk a few hours before switching on...”

  “Only a few hours? We shan’t have time! As you know, the approach time of large space ships is... they are like space elephants, they aren’t responsive enough. Surely it ought to be possible to provide the information earlier?”

  “I was the one who proposed that the president should only have the information just before the start. He is not in charge of the technical side, there’s no reason for him to have information he doesn’t need. That’s why, as I say, the data will come in just a few hours beforehand, no earlier than that. We don’t want to arouse unnecessary suspicions, do we?”

  “But...”

  The senior of the three made a calming gesture to the others, who shut up at once.

  “If there’s no other way, we’ll just have to put up with it.”

  The smile finally left LeRoy’s face, which nevertheless became more friendly.

  “Quite right. I’ll make sure we get it done in time. To do that, we’ll have to use some reserve ships. I don’t know where the jump will be from, but for technical reasons, there are only four regions in question. Therefore, we need four absolutely identical ships at four points, ready for takeoff.”

  The three put their heads together and began whispering. LeRoy turned his back on them and started softly whistling some tune or other as he looked at his fingers.

  “I’m afraid that four ships with the equipment we need will cost us a considerable sum. So considerable that the viability of the project would be called into question,” said the leader, when they had finally finished whispering.

  LeRoy stopped whistling and turned back towards them.

  “You mean you won’t be able to find enough to finance it?”

  “No, of course we can finance it. It’s something else. These are different conditions, after all. The cost of the project has increased. To keep to the previous share of participation would be...”

  LeRoy leaned forward, groped in his briefcase, took out the cube and put it on the table.

  “The game will go on as long as our agreement is in force. Changing the terms, even the hint of a change, means I leave the project. Remember that, gentlemen. Have a productive day.”

  7

  For the whole 20 minutes Steve was on the train, he kept looking away from his tablet and at the drinks and snacks machine humming softly a few paces away. Its bright display was showing cyclic video clips of rivers of cold beer and fresh fruit juices, periodically interspersed with contented people cracking big nuts and eating succulent hot dogs, crunchy potato chips.

  The images were having a torture-like effect on Steve’s hungry body, since he had overslept that morning and had not had time for breakfast, but he steeled himself against the thought of approaching the machine. There was complete silence outside as the mountain landscapes rushed past. It would only be another five minutes to the campus, ten at most. He would lunch there and lunch well, giving full reign to his hunger. It would be a pity to spoil his appetite with snacks. He once again forced himself to ignore the mental picture of getting up, going to the machine, pulling out a steaming hot dog and adding a generous amount of ketchup before devouring it.

  Steve opened today’s menu for their university refectory on his tablet. Over the past few years, it had improved the dishes it had on offer considerably and had even won a prize for the best university refectory in the country... Ah, his favorite pancakes with vanilla custard were on today. One serving usually consisted of two pancakes, which he ha
d always considered somewhat inadequate. Perhaps he’d place a double order today... Steve closed his tablet and put it away in his rucksack. He still couldn’t keep his mind on science. Thoughts of food were forcing everything else out...

  The train suddenly entered a tunnel. Not far to the campus now. He rose from his seat, collected his things and moved towards the door. Outside, a couple of feet from the windows, the tunnel lights were flashing past. The train’s very high speed produced the effect of someone having switched on a stroboscope to put the passengers in festive mood. Just like a disco, enough to hurt your eyes...

  Steve caught the aroma of vanilla custard a good few meters from the refectory. The smell, multiplied by his hunger, made him quicken his pace. He heard someone running up behind him and glanced back over his shoulder.

  Clive’s unbuttoned jacket was blowing in the wind as he ran and he waved to attract Steve’s attention. Typical of him to appear just at the most inappropriate moment.

  “I’m so glad I found you!” puffed Clive as he reached him.

  “What’s happened?”

  “I had a call from Shelby, he wants us both to go and see him at once.”

  “Couldn’t it wait till after lunch?”

  “No, no, no! He said it’s a matter of the greatest urgency. It’s a bit late for lunch anyway...”

  Steve looked sadly at the entrance to the refectory building and sighed deeply. The aroma of vanilla was so intense and tempting that the thought of going to Shelby’s study instead filled him with deep regret.

  “Clive, I’ve come straight from the conference, I’ve only just landed. I haven’t had a bite to eat since yesterday evening. You go, I’ll be along in half an hour or so.”

  He would have walked on towards the refectory, but Clive grabbed his sleeve.