With only a few hours left before the Vanuatu would depart the solar system, at the absolute peak of all the frantic rushing about and packing involved with last minute preparations, Henry received a message from an unknown number that gave him pause.
> Maybe: Grand Admiral Zhu
>
> Forger. This is Admiral Zhu. Drop whatever you’re doing and report to my office
>
> You
>
> Roger, sir. Where is it?
>
> Tenth floor, walk down to the end of the hall. Look for my name, assuming your eyes work
>
> On my way now
>
> The sentry already knows you’re coming. Hurry up
>
>
Henry’s eyes rolled as he pocketed his phone. He exited his room, walking quickly in the direction of the elevator at the far end of the barracks hallway.
It would not be his first time in flag country, but entering the tenth floor was always a daunting prospect. It was similar to stepping foot into a den of lions. Survival depended on if they’d eaten anything recently.
The elevator was empty, for once. As it carried him upward, Henry took a glance at his wristwatch. It was already almost five in the morning. Between all the things he’d had to do, and the excitement of imminent departure, the idea of sleep simply hadn’t occurred to him.
Well, whatever, he thought. Doesn’t really matter. Eighty years of sleep should make up for it.
The elevator came to a gentle stop upon reaching the tenth floor and its doors slid open silently. A tired looking sergeant wearing the black-blue digital fatigues of the spaceborne marines sat behind a desk positioned in the hallway just a few feet away. The marine blinked hard, then took a slow glance at the name tape on Henry’s uniform and waved him through wordlessly.
A few flag officers in various states of dress passed Henry as he quickly strode down the long carpeted hallway, most looking just as sleepy as the desk-marine. Quietly, so as to not draw attention, he let out a sigh of relief. The lions were full.
He came to a sudden halt after spotting the admiral’s nameplate beside one of the doors lining the right side of the hallway, though he nearly continued on. Music blared from the room beyond, involving instruments he’d never heard before and bizarre, boisterous singing in a language he didn’t recognize. He felt almost embarrassed to interrupt it, hesitating for several seconds before depressing the intercom button beneath the nameplate. A chime sounded within the room and the music came to an abrupt halt.
After a few moments of silence a tinny voice erupted from the intercom.
“Yes?”
“It’s Captain Forger, sir.”
The door immediately opened, and Henry stepped inside. He came to attention as it closed behind him, lifting his arm to give a crisp salute.
“Reporting as ordered.”
“Relax, Forger. This isn’t a formal meeting.”
Henry relaxed, and his gaze passed over the room. It was significantly larger than his own but practically empty—the walls were painted beige and completely bare. The only furniture present was a simple gray desk covered in messy stacks of paper positioned in the center of the room, with two fragile-looking folding chairs sitting before it. Zhu sat behind it, peering curiously at Henry as he scanned the room.
Zhu was wearing an admiral’s dress uniform, bright yellow trim against slate black, his chest glimmering with a superb array of shiny medals and colorful ribbons. On the wall a few feet behind him sat an oval window, giving an impressive view of space and a modest scattering of yellow-white stars.
He gestured impatiently to the chairs before his desk.
“Sit. I like to have a one on one meeting with everyone on my bridge staff whenever I assume a new command. I should’ve done this much earlier, but it’s been busy. Bringing people from all across the solar system here to Phobos is harder than it probably sounds. I apologize for how last minute this is.”
“No problem, sir,” Henry replied cheerfully as he seated himself.
Zhu nodded, then shifted a thick stack of papers in front of him.
“Most of my things are already on board. If you were wondering why my office is empty.”
“I figured. Sir.”
“Hm….”
A slight frown crossed Zhu’s face as his attention dropped to the stack of papers. Henry studied him while he flipped through it. With every motion, Zhu seemed to exude a certain hard-to-pin-down sureness, a self-assured confidence in himself that could only be found amongst the most senior flag officers. He had unremarkable looks and was somewhat heavy set, the skin of his face sagging a bit here and there with age. His black hair was short and faded in the standard military style. Gray was present at his temples, causing Henry to wonder why he would be delaying age treatment. Judging by his looks and last name, he guessed Zhu to be a Jovian.
On his uniform’s ribbon rack, Zhu had the most ribbons that Henry had ever seen—eight rows of three, with a centered half row at the bottom holding an additional two. And while all of his ribbons were colorful and eye-catching, one of the ribbons in the top row stood out from the rest. It had a black background and three colored vertical stripes, red-gray-red.
Henry stared at it, thinking. That ribbon…that’s the Earth Expeditionary Medal? Never seen a living person with that one.
“I just came from the commencement ceremony.”
Abashed, Henry’s gaze lifted from Zhu’s ribbons.
After taking a moment to cast a look of mild displeasure at Henry, Zhu’s attention returned to the stack of papers. Henry followed his gaze, and finally realized that Zhu had been looking through his file.
“Captain Henry Forger. Born in Tycho City, Luna, 2933.”
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Henry braced himself for the normal reaction people had after hearing where he was from, but to his surprise Zhu didn’t seem to care.
“Hmm…I’ve been to Tycho,” he said, absently tapping a finger against his desk. “I was one of the troops standing in formation before the Supreme Commander when he first announced the invasion.”
“You mean that announcement? Sir?”
Zhu’s nod contained visible pride.
“Oh. Yeah, I remember watching that video in middle school.”
Henry watched as Zhu’s expression briefly soured before his attention returned to the file.
What’d I say wrong?
“Remanded into the care of the government at age eight. Joined the USSF academy at age sixteen.” One of his eyebrows lifted with surprise. “Graduated third of your class. Well. That’s quite an achievement.”
“Thanks, sir.”
“I graduated first of my class. But who’s counting?”
Henry’s mouth instantly fell open to snark back, then closed when he remembered who he was talking to.
“Not me, sir.”
A faint smile tugged at the corners of Zhu’s mouth as he continued. “Served as an ‘angle pilot in the sixteenth air wing. You saw action in the Chaos Belt?”
“Against Gravvers and Belters,” Henry replied, nodding. “Yes, sir.”
“Hm. Four kills….”
Zhu leaned back in his chair, studying Henry in abrupt silence with his brows furrowed.
“Why did you switch to transmissions before your fifth? Being an ace is just about the best possible mark anyone can have on their record. It seems foolish for an accomplished ‘angle jock to pass that up.”
Henry blinked. “...There’s been plenty of aces, sir. But there’s only one Vanuatu.”
“You switched to FTLTO just to join the colonization program?”
“That’s right, sir.”
Zhu stared at him in thoughtful silence for a few moments before continuing.
“Choosing the Vanuatu’s complement of military personnel was entirely up to me. Did you know that? We needed the kind of people who could cover multiple roles if necessary, for what I hope are obvious reasons. Everyone on board has experience in multiple necessary professions, including the civilians. Especially the civilians.”
He leaned forward. “There were quite a few people better qualified to be our transmissions officer than you, Forger. But we’re light on combat experience. That’s why you were chosen.”
“...Yes, sir.”
“And as the FTLTO you’re gonna stay exactly where you’re meant to stay and do exactly what you’re meant to do. You are not going to run off and join the marines on boarding actions or fly off with one of the shuttles unless I explicitly order you to. You are not a jock anymore. You are a bridge nerd. Is that understood?”
“Understood, sir.”
“Good,” Zhu said, then leaned forward to continue reading. “It says here you were a flight commander before the switch. That’s you plus four other people? So something like…five ‘angles?”
“Something like that,” Henry said wryly.
“When I was a young captain I was in command of about a hundred men and women, plus a dozen vehicles.”
“Well, who’s counting, sir?”
“Me,” Zhu smirked. “I am.”
Henry rolled his eyes.
“And speaking of machines. You should know that we have two artificial intelligences on board.”
At that, Henry suddenly stiffened up, then leaned forward slightly as if he hadn’t heard him correctly.
“...Sir?”
“That was my initial reaction as well,” Zhu said, frowning. “Unfortunately there’s no getting around it. The speed we’ll be traveling at means we have to stay in the hibernation creches for the duration. One AI will monitor us as we sleep, the other will handle navigation.”
“They’re as dumb as they possibly can be,” Zhu quickly assured him. “And they have no physical way to connect with the other networks on the ship, or each other. If our data link does get invaded it won’t be from the shipboard AIs.”
“Does that mean we’re expecting to run into SAIs?”
He shook his head. “No. We don’t expect them. Newton Theta Fifty-Six is far enough away from Sol that we think it’s unlikely they’ll already be there when we arrive. But it is possible. Seventy light years is very far for us, but it’s hard to say what their capabilities might be.”
Henry responded with a hesitant nod. Fear of the SAIs was universal, one of the few things that ever united people in common cause. They had been a constant threat for eight centuries, one the entire solar system had been forced to live with regardless of proximity to Earth. Officially there’d been no contact with the SAIs since all the chaos involved with the invasion that’d occurred twenty-five years ago. Unofficially, SAIs had been spotted in the shadows of every asteroid and space station between Mercury and Pluto.
Everyone knew about the danger AIs posed, everyone feared them, and no one used them. Or at least, no one sane used them. The colonization program had begun in part as a response to the threat the SAIs still posed. An attempt to ensure humanity’s survival by spreading to more solar systems. And ever since the exodus from Earth eight centuries ago, virtually all forms of AI had been made illegal throughout the inner solar system. The fact that the laws and taboos surrounding them had apparently been lifted for the Vanuatu was alarming—an incredibly unwelcome wrinkle on top of what was sure to be a risky colonization mission.
Judging by the irritated frown on Zhu’s face, he shared Henry’s discomfort with AI. Henry watched as he rushed through the rest of his file until he reached a nearly blank cover sheet towards the end simply labeled: “psychological profile”.
Henry was taken off guard. Hold up, they’ve got a psych eval on me?
Zhu quickly slapped the file shut, then settled back in his chair.
“I think that’s enough for now. We both have other tasks to complete before we set off. Do you have any questions for me?”
“Yes. Uh.…”
He’d had loads of questions, but now that he was being pressed none of the important ones came to mind.
“What was that music you were listening to? Before I came in. Sir.”
Zhu raised a dubious eyebrow, as though he doubted Henry’s sincerity. “Opera. It was popular in some countries on Earth about a thousand years ago. I find it still has a certain charm.”
Henry nodded slowly. “...Were you on Earth? Sir?”
The question caused an immediate change to come over Zhu. There’d been a certain playfulness about him before, but now his expression hardened.
“Yes. That’ll be all, Forger. Go relax. Enjoy what’s left of your time in the Sol system.”
“Roger sir,” Henry replied sheepishly while getting to his feet.
“Bridge crew is leaving from bay three in two hours. You’re piloting the shuttle.”
Once again, Henry was taken off guard, but he recovered quickly.
“...Understood, sir.”
With that he left the room, kicking himself.
Why’d I ask that? I’m a moron.
He took the elevator back down to the third level and returned to his room, but as he resumed packing no sense of relaxation ever arrived. Only anxious worries about the future, the threat of being murdered in his long sleep by an AI, and the fear that he might’ve already soured his relationship with the boss.