“Drills will be held immediately following this meeting in the use of filter masks,” Colonel Matthews said. “Remove your filter planetside and you won’t die, maybe, but you risk infection from native diseases that you could then carry back to this unit. Removing filters inappropriately is grounds for court-martial. Does everyone understand that?”
“Yes, sir!”
Leo wondered if he could sight and shoot as well through the faceplate of some fucking filter helmet. He hadn’t so much as seen the thing before, and he sure couldn’t test it regarding marksmanship while aboard the ship. Had the CO thought of that?
“The shuttle, human built, is large enough,” Captain Lewis said, “to hold everyone for transport but not as habitat, which it will become once we are on ground. Navy personnel will stay aboard the ship except for Lieutenant Yi, who will pilot the shuttle. Colonel Matthews plans to leave one of his soldiers aboard as well.”
Why? That made no sense to Salah, but then, he had never been in the military. To prevent mutiny? Looting? Hijacking? Seriously?
“Although it will be a habitat, the shuttle will also make four scheduled trips to the ship to reload supplies, exchange personnel as needed, and allow our scientists access to the greater computing power of—Ladies and gentlemen, there goes the moon.”
All heads swiveled to the wall screen. In a single eye blink, the moon loomed off to the left and then dwindled, no more than a firefly in the night. How fast was the Friendship moving? He would have to look it up.
Another miracle. Another adaptive normal. The meeting resumed.
“We have now passed the moon,” Colonel Matthews announced. He must, Leo realized, be receiving information from the bridge. Well, cool—that’s what the CO’s data glasses were for, but they were so sleek and normal-looking that Leo hadn’t even realized. Great tech!
The filter masks weren’t too bad, either. The thing wasn’t a helmet or a big-ass gas mask, after all. Made of some clear, flexible plastic, it fit snugly—really snugly—over his mouth and nose and sealed itself to his face. A bulge under one ear held some sort of tiny motor. The mask kept Terrans from breathing in microbes their bodies couldn’t handle, but microbes in the air still could get on their skin and in “other orifices,” so protocol would be to wear wet suits when they were out of base. At least, they looked like wet suits to Leo, covering pretty much everything. The gloves were thinskin and really flexible, but they were still gloves and he didn’t like shooting with gloves. Another problem.
“Brodie,” Colonel Matthews said, “everybody else has drilled with this equipment for weeks. Your duty roster includes sessions with Kandiss to thoroughly familiarize yourself with the equipment.”
Leo nodded. He was the FNG—Fucking New Guy—and way behind the curve. But he was a fast learner.
Matthews said, “Duty rosters, including exercise periods, are as follows—”
The meeting droned on. Marianne fought drowsiness. She knew all of this information—everybody here knew all of this information. They’d had classes on it. Now the astrophysicist and geologist were reciting the known facts about Kindred’s physical properties, along with speculations on its geologic history. When they finished—and please God, let it be soon—probably Maria Gonzalez was going to repeat what was known about Kindred social structure. What if Marianne pleaded a headache and—
The wall screen, which had shown black space studded with stars, suddenly went completely dark. The PA system said, “Captain Lewis and Ambassador Gonzalez to the bridge. Repeat, Captain Lewis and Ambassador Gonzalez to the bridge.”
David Sherman, geologist, stopped in midsentence. He and the astrophysicist looked at each other. A moment later the PA said, “Dr. McKenzie to the bridge. Repeat, Dr. McKenzie to the bridge.”
The astrophysicist disappeared through the door. Before anyone could stop her, Marianne followed him.
David Sherman struggled on a moment more: “As I was saying, the molten core of Kindred is… isn’t…” He stopped again.
Stars reappeared on the wall screen.
In the middle of helmet drill—not hard, but Leo still had no answer about its effect on sighting targets—Colonel Matthews suddenly went intent, listening to something no one else could hear. Then he said to Owen, “Lieutenant, take over,” and strode from the room.
The Rangers glanced covertly at each other.
Captain Lewis, affability gone, said tightly, “Dr. Jenner, you were not summoned. Please leave the bridge.”
“No,” the ambassador said, “let her stay. She’s the only one with any experience with Kindred; maybe she can shed some light on this.”
The door flung open and Colonel Matthews strode into the room. He addressed Lewis sharply. “Captain, I expect to be included in discussions when something of this nature occurs.”
It seemed to Marianne that Lewis wanted to say something in the same tone as Matthews—Christ, not a turf war just six hours out! But Lewis was too good for that. He caught himself and said, “You’re right, Colonel. My apologies. What has happened is that all communication with Earth has ceased. It happened at the moment the stars… blinked.”
Blinked. That must have meant the Friendship had jumped from one side of the ambassador’s piece of cloth to the other. But that wasn’t supposed to happen yet! Or, rather, it hadn’t happened that way when the Kindred ship approached Earth eleven years ago. There had been two weeks of sightings by NASA, SETI, the European and Chinese and Russian space agencies, and every amateur astronomer who knew where to point a telescope. The Friendship was supposed to have two weeks in the solar system before she jumped.
Greg McKenzie had been working at the computer. He said, “Ambassador, we’ve arrived. This is the Kindred system.”
Marianne swiveled to face the wall screen. All she saw was a fuzzy orange disk in the black sky. Around it were other, brighter stars.
Gonzalez recovered fast. “Very well,” she said. “We all knew that the ship’s drive was preset to arrive back at Kindred, but I guess we didn’t realize how quickly we would arrive. Captain Lewis, are we now traveling at normal ship speed?”
Marianne had to suppress an insane giggle. What was “normal” under these circumstances?
Evidently Captain Lewis agreed. “I have no idea, Madam Ambassador. Mr. Volker?”
The Navy engineer said, “We are traveling at the same speed as before we, ah, jumped. At this speed, assuming it remains constant, we are three weeks away from arriving at the planet.”
“Thank you,” Gonzalez said. “Captain, can we speak to the planet now?”
“I’ll try.”
Owen must have been equipped with some way to hear Colonel Matthews, or something, because he broke off in the middle of a sentence and said, “As of now, this unit is on red alert. Battle stations, now.”