Beyond Asimios: Book One Read online

  Beyond Asimios

  Book One

  Copyright © 2015 by Martin Fossum

  Cover Art by Allan H. Johnson

  Chapters:

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  1

  —DOCTOR GRAF, YOU HAVE NINE…

  Dr. Graf had refreshed the alerts on his Visual/Interface and he regretted it. He cut out the lilting female voice and scrolled through his messages:

  1. A. Halpern—ESCOM—Doctor Graf, I wanted to say…

  2. A. Halpern—ESCOM—Doctor Graf, Please…

  3. A. Halpern—ESCOM—Doctor Graf, I know you’ve been…

  4. A. Halpern—ESCOM—Graf, Goddammit…

  5. A. Halpern—ESCOM—I get the feeling that you…

  6. A. Halpern—ESCOM…

  Graf uncorked the bottle of Scotch and took another slug. A sweep of his hand cleared his VI and he sat for a moment while he looked past the field of solar arrays to the horizon that stretched upward in a black carpet of diamonds.

  When Dr. Avery Graf was installed as Director of Asimios Station eighteen years ago he was determined not to fail. He was determined not to repeat the ecological and social catastrophe that had been perpetrated on Mars. On Asimios he would approach terraforming with better science. The components were all there: tectonic activity, masssive reserves of polar ice, a robust geomagnetic field, and Asimios’s star, Stelos Proxima, provided stable solar radiation. Synchronizing these resources put Asimios Station on track for being the first self-sustaining non-Earth settlement, and a model for all future colonial expansion.

  One small issue remained: no one knew exactly where Asimios was.

  Even though their terraforming project had exceeded expectations, the star system that contained the planet remained unidentifiable. The wormhole that connected the two solar systems, discovered thirty-two years earlier by a pair of UNLV astronomy students while tracking an asteroid (…the asteroid had disappeared), was a mystery that raised more questions than it answered.

  Getting corporate interests to understand the theoretical science behind a wormhole was easy. Explaining to them just why an apparently large and stable wormhole appeared out of nowhere—that was a harder sell. In the end, it appeared that the risks were too high. As Graf saw it, ESCOM’s transnational advisory committee had grown nervous about the multi-trillion-dollar enterprise. Building a human settlement on another planet was something to boast about (at least at the beginning), but costs for wormhole projects, it turned out, were prohibitively high. Within twelve months the twenty-two-year-old Asimios Station was winnowed down from a population of 2,642 to 15, and ESCOM was in the final hours of dismantling the entire project.

  As he stared at the stars, Graf could hear the sonorous rumble of the station’s climate-control fans and the moaning of Asimios’s winds as they brushed over the roof of the building. His chair creaked under his weight and he became aware of the gentle stirring of his own breath. He saw dust suspended in the cabin air—fine particles floating in the currents of entwining heat and cold, a demonstration of thermodynamics and the physics regulating the ebb and flow of life. He took another slug of Scotch, stuffed the cork back into the bottle and stood. He had balance. He tucked the bottle into one of his pockets, smoothed over the remaining strands of hair that sat atop his shiny head, and ran a few chubby fingers through his graying beard.

  As he left his cabin he ran into an ESCOM demolition crew making its way down the hall. They were wearing combat skins and sidearms and carrying ominous metallic briefcases. A pair of sentry bots floated behind them like tethered balloons. When they were gone Graf took out his bottle and extracted another dose of medicine. He growled and spat on the floor. Just then one of the sentry bots reappeared—it had disengaged from the team—and glided up to Graf. Graf flailed his hands to ward off the pest.

  —Oh, for Christ’s sake!

  The bot stuck close as Graf stomped his way through the station, through the lonely central marketplace, the eerily silent children’s school and theater district, the gangways and recreation halls, and past conference rooms with tables and chairs in various states of disarray. He passed additional ESCOM demo teams as they bustled here and there while groups of higher-level ESCOM officials huddled in conversations over what were clearly important and pressing matters. Graf swept an arc in the air with his hand and drew up his VI.

  —DOCTOR GRAF, YOU HAVE TWELVE UNOPENED PACKETS.

  At the edge of the mess hall, Graf felt a tug at his arm. As he turned he came face to face with his current nemesis and ESCOM overseer, Austin Halpern.

  —Graf, Austin Halpern rasped. I’ve been trying to reach you all afternoon. You’ve been ignoring me, haven’t you? Do this at your peril. I’ve got no time for your games.

  Austin Halpern had short gray hair, piercing green eyes and a sanctimonious slant to his mouth.

  —I expect to see you in my office in one hour for debriefing, he said. Understood?

  Graf placed his hand on the overseer’s shoulder and took a deep breath.

  —My dear, dear Austin, Graf said as he made sure the overseer got a good whiff of the whiskey coursing through his bloodstream. I have every intention of meeting with you for your “debriefing,” but there are certain things I need to take care of first…things to be included in my report. (He jabbed his index finger skyward for emphasis.) Now… I’ve participated in every way possible to accommodate you and your band of merry wastrels, and the last thing I need—after more than twenty years here—the last thing I need during the last hours on a planet that I have come to call home, is to stand in a mess hall and be berated by a company hoodlum—yes, that would be you—whose gratitude for my sacrifice and commitment borders on zero. So, call off your metallic pit bull (Graf swatted at the spherical bot hovering behind him and the bot swooped up and emitted an alarm as it activated a glowing green defense shield. A small and nasty-looking aperture opened on its side.) …and get off my back!

  After he finished, Graf pushed past Halpern and made for the door at the opposite side of the mess.

  —You’ve been drinking, Graf! Halpern shouted after him.

  —So what?

  —One hour. In my office!

  —Perfect. I’ll be there in two!

  The station crew and the ESCOM staff lingering in the mess were silent as Graf left the room. The bot that had been following him fell away. It spun around and heeded new instructions.

  Graf waved off his VI again as he entered the atrium and encountered an ESCOM demo squad huddling at one section of the tall, cylindrical room. He pulled out his Scotch and took a swallow. He wiped his sleeve across his face, slipped the bottle back in his pocket, and then turned toward the airlock to the south wing where the transport hubs branched from the center of the station. Two doors down the hall he hit an entry icon on the wall and a door slid open. He stepped inside.

  —Paul, you in here? Graf called.

  As the door slid shut Graf found himself standing in a room that looked like a gargantuan machine that had just imploded…its innards scattered into holy disarray. Nuts and bolts and strands of wire, solenoids, hydraulic rams, and relays littered the floor under heaps of unidentifiable larger material—titanium fiber atmosphere tiles, plasteel wheels and strips of crawler fuselage. Dismembered limbs (android limbs?) lined a high wall to Graf’s left, like a heap of discarded prosthetics from some medieval church. On his right was a barrel stuffed with old droid heads and Graf kicked one of the heads that lay on the floor, and it rolled a few oblique rotations before wedging itself under a roll of polyme
r matting. The room smelled of solder, acetylene, and penetrating oil, and somewhere in the back, beyond a canyon cut barely wide enough for an emaciated human to pass, was a quivering light and the whir of machines.

  Graf squeezed through the debris, lifting his arms above him as if wading through high water, until he emerged in a clearing at the rear of the room. Paul was leaning over his desk, absorbed in his work. A number of robotic arms scissored at blurring speed beneath a wide enlargement display, while small micro-weld flares cast a brilliant orange light over the room.

  —Hey, Avery, Paul said, his eyes still glued to his display.

  —Hey, Paul. Am I interrupting anything?

  A moment later the spidery arms came to a stop and Paul looked up.

  —Not at all, Paul said. I’ve been expecting you.

  Paul’s eyes were ovoid and black—tinted for protection—and a few seconds later they rinsed clear to their natural brown. Paul motioned towards an empty chair and asked Graf to remove his coat. The request struck Graf as odd.

  —I’ll keep this on, if you don’t mind, he grumbled as he dug in his pocket for the bottle and started to sit.

  —Please, said Paul. I insist. Miranda will take your coat. Miranda! called Paul over his shoulder. Could you please take Dr. Graf’s coat?

  From out of the shadows a droid appeared. She was naked to her frame—alloy and fibersteel—apart from a few patches of synthskin grafted to her face…and yet she was visually stunning. It wasn’t her physical appearance that drew Graf’s attention, it was her grace, her economy of motion. He’d never seen a droid so humanlike.

  —Pleasure to meet you, Graf said to Miranda as he surrendered his coat. Is she on payroll? he asked over to Paul as he returned to his seat.

  Miranda nodded and disappeared back into the shadows.

  —I don’t recall hiring her, Graf said.

  Graf took up the whiskey and pulled out the cork and took another drink. He pushed the bottle at Paul, but Paul demurred.

  —Are you sure? Graf said. This is the real deal. This might be the last time you’ll get a chance to share a drink with your old boss.

  —Thanks but no thanks, Paul said.

  Graf looked up at Paul from under his eyebrows. He closed his eyes and ran his hand over the dome of his head. Graf was tired—weary. He was drunk now and it was sad to sit here with an old workmate for what was very likely the last time, and his throat constricted as he tried to think of words that would lend dignity to the occasion. Graf observed Paul’s hands as they fished through a tray of metal washers. His fingers were tarnished from oils and metallic dust and his blond mustache was similarly stained. Paul was never a socialite. He was a scientist—an engineer of mechanical virtuosity—and perhaps, although it’s foolish to guess, more machine than human. He was classified as a semi-autist, a technical savant. Early on, when Hermes ran the operation, they needed someone who had a knack for applied science, who knew his tools, and had a talent for improvisation. Paul fit the bill. After the psych team cleared him for service, Paul left immediately for Asimios. That was fifteen years ago, give or take a few months. From the start he was an oddball—not one who cared much about his appearance—and he always smelled a bit off (a little more than the typical florid station staff), as if bathing seemed to him an inconvenience. Paul was reclusive in an environment where loud personalities and visions often clashed, and Graf grew to enjoy his taciturn and unprejudiced aloofness.

  —Don’t suppose there is anything you want to tell me before this shit hole turns into a puddle of melted steel? Graf said. Anything sentimental or heartfelt?

  Paul coughed, a kind of choking sneeze. It was the way he laughed, Graf knew. Paul turned back to his display.

  —Well, Graf went on. It’s been a pleasure. I can say that.

  Paul turned to Graf and frowned. Graf’s vision was blurring. The alcohol was taking hold.

  —What are you working on, by the way? Graf asked as his eyes travelled over the table.

  —You know those sentry bots that came in with the ESCOM demo team? Paul said. Well, I’ve decided to do a little exploratory surgery on this one here. Just wanted to take a closer look.

  Paul grinned while he smoothed over his mustache several times with his thumb and forefinger.

  —You’ve stolen a sentry bot? Graf said. Oh, for god’s sake…

  — I’ve only borrowed it, Dr. Graf. It’s not very impressive, though, in my opinion. ESCOM’s doing a better with quantum magnetics, but they’re still a long way off. Mainly post-wormhole tech here. Should be a decent bot when I’m done with it, though.

  Graf groaned.

  —You realize that if they find out you’ve taken one of their bots they’ll throw you in a meat locker for your trip back to Earth?

  Paul shrugged.

  —They won’t know, Paul said as he patted down his mustache. Probably time you got going, don’t you think? he said.

  Graf’s face went blank.

  —Guess you’re right. I probably should be going.

  Paul called to Miranda and she stepped out of the shadows. When he took the jacket from the droid he noticed that it was heavier than before. He put it on and felt his pocket and then nodded gently as Miranda smiled and retreated.

  —Thank you, Graf said to Paul as he turned to shake his hand. Everything’s in order, I take it?

  Paul nodded.

  —Everything is in order, he said.

  —Well, said Graf. This is it, I guess…

  —This is it.

  —Once more unto the breach, dear friend… Do good things, Paul Ness, and remember me.

  —Your whiskey? Paul said as Graf was about to leave.

  Graf shook his head.

  —Do what you will with it. It’s served its purpose.

  Graf pushed his way through Paul’s office, and once outside, he turned and started for the station’s medical clinic where he had one more appointment before his showdown with Halpern. When he reached the atrium, the ESCOM demo crew was gone and in its place was a cordoned-off area: a “DO NOT ENTER – ALARM WILL SOUND” laser holo warned against entry. He steered clear and went down the science lab hall where he veered right and punched the entry icon to the clinic door. It slid open and he stepped inside.

  It was cool, very white, and very clean. Dr. Susanna Berdinka stood up from where she was sitting in front of a series of charts and text screens.

  —Come in, Avery, she said in her Slavic inflection. Come in and lie here and try to relax.

  She crossed the room to the surgical table and patted it softly with the palm of her hand.

  —Are we on schedule here? he said as he gave Susanna a lingering hug. Dr. Berdinka nodded. She patted the table and Graf shifted his large frame onto the surface.

  Dr. Berdinka looked as she always did: dark blond hair in a braid that favored her right shoulder; white medical bodysuit with nameplate over her left breast; and dark eyes that sat above a wide and sensual mouth.

  —I think you’ll find what you need in there, Graf grumbled as he presented his jacket.

  She fished through the pockets and removed a small box. She opened it and gave a quick inspection.

  —I’ve been doing my research, she said. This should not be a problem. It’s the optic nerve coupling that was tricky in the past, but not now.

  Graf felt a strange numbness overcome him, a feeling of surrender, as Dr. Berdinka placed her hand on his chest and forced him back on the table. The table was warm. A strange hum sounded as two mech surgical assistants maneuvered into place, their serpentine arms poised for instruction. A klieg lamp descended over Graf’s face and Graf was momentarily blinded. Dr. Berdinka cleared her throat and then redirected the beam.

  —Ten years ago this would have taken a team of surgeons eight hours with a success rate of 72 percent, Dr. Berdinka said as she pulled a tray of equipment toward her.

  Graf grunted. He could feel his heart thumping against his ribs.

  —Today it
takes less than an hour with 98 percent success.

  —Technology is amazing, isn’t it? Graf said through clenched teeth.

  He had slept with Dr. Berdinka twice. The first time they were drunk. The second time they weren’t, and that was when he realized that they had very little in common. This all happened, of course, long after his wife, Julie, had died. But that never seemed to be sufficient consolation and he still felt guilt over the misadventure. Truth is, at the time he just wanted to remember what it was like to make love, and Susanna happened to be the nearest willing partner. Grief is a fickle shadow…and that shadow led him down that path.

  Dr. Berdinka leaned into the light and told Graf that she was about to administer a sedative. He felt a sting in his arm.

  —Lay still, Dr. Graf, she said before she left the table, and Graf closed his eyes and waited for the anesthetic to take effect.

  Julie Singh joined the Asimios Station staff about three years after the station was online. She was a distinguished botanist on Earth and had won high praise by the Earth/Asimios review board. Once on Asimios she became integral in devising a fungus and bacterial injection process for early stage terraforming and she fell in naturally with Graf and the terraforming team. She had a bright personality and was an infectious optimist who could push forward even the most freighted projects. She had an excellent mind: she was flawless at poker and was a ranked chess player. All this combined to make her beautiful, Graf thought. She had a head of thick, smooth hair, and dark, attentive eyes that were quick to assess the subtleties of situations. They were interesting contrasts, Graf and Singh: where he was large and bearish, she was petite and physically delicate. Where he was garrulous and outspoken, she was cautious and circumspect. They admired one another for their differences and concluded that they made the perfect match. Within a year they were married on the top of Mt. Utrecht, Asimios’s sixteenth tallest peak, to a handful of cheering friends and coworkers.