FIVE
THE ULIETTA SYSTEM, ZEBRA SECTOR
10/23/2354
“We’ll emerge from hyperspace in three, two, one …”
The computers came back to life, the panoramic screens of the control room suddenly full of images depicting the nearby star and its planetary system. FSS Djangonzalo Cervantes’ crew would have to rely solely on the sensor readings for another six minutes. Visuals were to be back when the massive cruiser did an about-face and the central star disappeared behind its stern.
Immediately, the first reports sprang up on the command post screens. They were soon followed by more data. The vast majority were calmingly green; orange could be seen only here and there, but that was to be expected. The ship’s shields worked with maximum capacity, and some generators were experiencing local overloads. Not something that could jeopardize the mission.
Henryan looked through the alerts without focusing too much on them. That was technicians’ job. Fairly routine procedures which they’d gone through hundreds of times since joining the Fleet. He saw them around him in the dim light of the large bridge. They were working in quiet concentration, like machines. He didn’t notice any signs of anxiety or nervousness. They’d keep a cool head until they saw red on the displays in front of them—
“Damn,” Henryan swore under his breath, seeing a flickering ruby dot in the upper right-hand corner of his display. With a tingle at the base of his skull, he opened a brief report sent from the navigational section. Nothing was wrong with his ship, but besides the cruiser, there were colonist arks as well as more than sixty transporters in the convoy. Failure or loss of any of these vessels would mean serious problems. This mission had received the highest priority—though why, Henryan had yet to find.
He didn’t even know why he’d been given orders to hand over the command of the evacuation operations to another officer, but he hadn’t challenged them, and despite the protests of the despairing colonists, he’d immediately left Uganda 6.
In Belt S he’d joined a newly formed convoy—or rather a motley array of colony ships, transporters, and warships, hastily withdrawn from other squadrons in this part of the Belt—and after receiving further directives, he’d made a jump to Ulietta. As he hadn’t had time to organize a proper briefing then, now he was worried that one of the accompanying civilian vessels started to fall apart, jeopardizing the entire operation.
He read the first sentence and felt overwhelming relief. The report was not about the convoy, but about one of the Ulietta’s planets.
“What do you think, Commodore Hines?” he asked, turning to the cruiser’s co-commander, a young Latino with deep-set black eyes and an aquiline nose. When on the bridge, within earshot of their subordinates, they always addressed each other in accordance with regulations.
Javiernesto was flipping through the Fleet’s astroatlas files to check previous entries. When he was done, he shook his head decisively.
“I’ve never heard of such a classification error,” he said. “It’s just impo—”
“We’re on the intercept course.” Darski’s next words were drowned by a message from the navigator’s post.
The side screens filled with star-studded blackness of space and the front one showed the Galactic Center, on which background gleamed eighteen globes of the Ulietta system. From this distance, they didn’t differ from the stars in any way, but luckily, the computer marked them with special tags.
“Delta’s scan,” barked Hines.
“Aye aye, sir.”
They were heading toward the ecliptic plane of the system, so at this moment, Delta could be seen at the top of the domed screen. They had to crane their necks to detect it. Soon, however, a tiny white spot began to grow, and a few seconds later, it obscured the view, taking up most of the gigantic holoscreen.
The majestic blue and white sphere looked like the truest oxygen-rich planet. At first glance, it wasn’t much different from Earth, partially hidden beneath the dense veil of clouds, covered with russet outlines of continents and sapphire oceans—including intrinsic polar ice caps.
“It’s impossible,” Hines repeated, shifting his gaze to Darski.
According to the astronavigational atlas, they should have been looking at a radiation-scorched, devoid of atmosphere piece of rock with not even one ice crystal, not to mention a living bacterium. At least this was what the long-range recon analysts had stated while classifying the globe, and what later had been approved by the Astronavigational Committee. Exactly the same information was to be found in all the documents of Etoile Blanc Corporation, which had an exclusive license to exploit Ulietta’s resources.
“Has it been terraformed?” Henryan asked incredulously after he’d shaken off his initial shock.
It was the first oxygen-rich planet he’d seen with his own eyes. In all the Known Universe, which comprised five metasectors, there were only thirty-seven globes having their own atmosphere, and only twenty-nine of them were oxygen-rich; that is, Earthlike to the extent that people could live on them after introducing some changes in the ecosphere, more commonly referred to as terraforming.
“No,” Hines disagreed. “Over four years, you can make significant changes to the composition of the atmosphere and begin to vanquish the biosphere, but it’s certainly not possible to change a piece of stone-dead rock into a copy of Earth, bustling with life. Just look at the readings …”
Henryan glanced at his display. Ninety-two percent of standard gravity, temperatures ranging from minus eighty-three degrees at the poles to plus forty-four in the equatorial zone, the axial tilt of forty-two degrees, the composition of the atmosphere slightly different from the Earth’s, although—as per spectrum analysis—in the troposphere there were still gases presenting danger to humans. However, they occurred in such small amounts that people could spend on the surface a standard day without using breathing apparatus. With specialized equipment, life on Delta would be a fairy tale.
“I don’t want to make any assumptions, but I think I know why there was such a rush to leave Uganda 6,” Darski said. “Apparently, we’ve found someone’s private paradise.”
The fact that some corporation could afford such a gigantic scam was beyond him, and yet he was looking at the evidence. If it hadn’t been for the alien invasion, the existence of this planet would have been known only to a narrow circle of insiders …
A flashing yellow light brought him out from his reverie. Right after leaving hyperspace, Henryan reported that the convoy had reached its destination, and now he received a reply. Although the quantum message didn’t come from the metasector’s High Command as he’d expected, but from the Admiralty. It came directly from the Central Systems, without going through the proper channels.
He didn’t accept the communication straight away. For a brief moment, he held his finger over the flashing yellow key, as if he was afraid that with just one brush of the virtual surface, he would lay out trouble for himself. He’d just wriggled out of a penal colony and even worse shit on Xan 4. My rehabilitation is all well and good, Darski thought, glancing suspiciously at the blue and white globe before him. But … am I not the perfect scapegoat for these clones-of-bitches in ridiculous hats?
Even the thought of gruff Dr. Godbless didn’t cheer him up. Someone in the Admiralty knew exactly what they were doing when they sent him here.
Henryan lowered his finger. The flashing icon was replaced by a message box, which contents turned his hitherto knowledge about this system upside down.