“Over time, all of you will be awakened to stand at least one watch, maintaining order and authority over the aging crew of junior Intendants. Shortly after reaching midpoint, we will breed a small, accelerated second generation of Intendants from the ex vitro vats, to replace those who are awake and approaching infirmity.”
The lights dimmed and the intercom tone chimed. Bikrut’s head and chin rose slightly. “I order the Sixth Exodate to set forth. And let the annals show that I name this ship, our Ark, the Photrek Courser.” The deck came up firmly beneath their feet. “We are under way.”
— 6 —
Harrod fought up out of the stiff, chilly fog that concluded the process of cryogenic reanimation. And was surprised to find that he was alone—except for Overlord Bikrut Mellis. Startled, Harrod attempted to sit up, to attain a respectful posture—but the sudden movement impaled him upon a spike of core-wrenching nausea: he vomited bile and glycerine-purging fluids upon the floor. “My apologies, my Overlord,” he gasped between bouts of retching.
“Be unconcerned,” grunted the Overlord, who waited until the worst of the spasms had subsided. “Now, attend me.”
Harrod looked up groggily—and suddenly realized that, for Bikrut to be here, something must be wrong. Very wrong. “Yes, my Overlord?”
“There is no cause for alarm. My participation in this waking cycle was always intended. We simply did not communicate it beyond the operations team that has now corrected our demographic problem.”
A new coldness grew slowly at the base of Harrod’s sore diaphragm. “A …a demographic problem, my Overlord?”
“Yes. The presence of House Shaddock. But as I said, that problem has been rectified.” Bikrut smiled.
“Their cryogenic cells—?”
“Precisely. Killed as they slept. Easiest that way. Those who we need at the end of the voyage will be kept in cold sleep.”
“My Overlord, if you do not awaken them until our arrival—”
“Do not concern yourself, Intendant: we are aware that seventy years of uninterrupted cryogenic sleep is neither physically, nor mechanically, advisable. But we are staging their reanimations so that there are never more than three awake at any time—and for very short periods: never more than a month. Towards the end of our journey, we will replace the lost numbers with vat-grown helots. They will be our initial workforce and environmental test subjects. Come: stand and walk. You have much work to do. And only a year in which to do it.”
Harrod almost slipped off the table as he swung his legs to the deck. “Yes, my Overlord.”
— 7 —
Harrod exited the command section and performed a slow ninety-degree mid-air tumble: his feet came up to rest against the bulkhead he had just drifted through. As the access hatch autosealed beside him, he reached down for a hand-hold, pulled his body into a squat while still keeping his feet flush against the bulkhead. Then he released the hand-hold and kicked free.
In the zero gee of the Photrek Courser’s midcourse glide, this push sent him arrowing down the broad keel-way of the ship, the trussed sections moving past him like a cubist tunnel of groined vaults. Speeding past dozens of module access doors, he did not start grazing his fingertips against the ceiling until he was within twenty meters of the midship array. As he began to slow, he also started a slow rotation into a feet-first attitude.
Having had almost a year of practice, Harrod timed the transition almost perfectly: the plane of his body was parallel with the ceiling as he slowed into a leisurely drift and reached out to grab the hatch-ring of the access tube. He tugged to a stop, and oriented himself; the impression that the access hatchway was in the ceiling was suddenly gone. The visual sense of up/down quickly recalibrated: now, there was no perceivable difference between the ceiling, floor, and bulkhead. He opened the hatch manually and towed himself inside.
Once in the array’s dim control suite, he strapped himself into the lead operator’s chair and assessed the equipment’s status. The sensors themselves were continuing the routine he’d initiated two weeks ago; the computer—its blue flickers ghostly in the inky suite—was still grinding through the reams of data they’d gathered on what was to be their new home.
Still at seven light years distance, the Courser’s sensors were straining to get anything useful at all. To make matters worse, the midship array was primarily a communications cluster: the main sensor array at the bow was unavailable. Photrek Courser’s current segment of travel had brought her within half a light year of a brown dwarf, increasing the densities of both available volatiles and useless dust. Consequently, the Courser’s best array was fully committed to detecting and eliminating navigational hazards while the ram scoop replenished a little hydrogen. Even more important were the sparse amounts of oxygen they gathered: the hydroponics had not functioned as well as hoped. The ninety-nine percent closed bioloop of the life-support system had proven to be more like a ninety-six percent closed bioloop, so any oxygen was a very welcome addition to their resources. But with the main array committed to these crucial tasks, Harrod’s long-range planetographic data-gathering had been unavoidably retasked to the secondary, midship array.
The good news from these sensors was that a bit of new data had finally emerged from the spectral minutiae. The bad news was that the data were not particularly encouraging. At least, Harrod reflected, Bikrut was not around to receive the report: his next awakening was still some years off.
The computer was now able to construct a graphic of the system’s six planets, but the one in the second, habitable orbit was flagged red. A small world with a thick atmosphere, the greatest fears regarding its suitability had been the possibilities that the atmosphere was comprised of lethal gases or that its proximity to the primary would produce a runaway greenhouse effect.
Unfortunately, according to the data, the news was worse than either alternative—because it indicated that both conditions existed. The atmosphere was largely carbon dioxide, with a heavy mix of sulfur compounds, and a planetside equatorial temperature of about 290 degrees centigrade, plus or minus thirty degrees.
So now all their hopes centered on the rather scant possibility that the smallish gas giant in the third position would have a suitable satellite. However, at this distance, even the main arrays of the Photrek Courser would have been unable to acquire reliable data on a moon. Perhaps its mass and period could be discerned, if they were very lucky. But the typical profusion of satellites about a gas giant made gravimetric, and therefore orbital, data suspect, so focused observation upon any one of those worldlets would remain impossible until they got considerably closer.
Harrod turned off the computer and stared at the dim, orange-lit controls. Now the debates would begin: with the first vat-born crewmen to be decanted within the decade, the old plans for a small generation of helots had to be revisited. Although originally envisioned as the first settlement wave, there was clearly need of a contingency plan if it turned out that there were no habitable moons. In that case, there would be no need for settlers, but an urgent need for a workforce which could ready the ship for a further voyage to another promising star. So, what mix of ready embryos should be fertilized for the autowombs and ultimately, the growth-acceleration vats? Would the Exodate need strong backs or strong brains?