Part 4 (1/2)

From their expressions it was clear they weren't sure whether to be relieved or insulted by the Intruder's disinterest. ”Then why is it coming here?” a.s.sembly-Prime Wu-sin asked.

”Reconnaissance, possibly, though that's unlikely. He's coming in at a steep angle to the ecliptic*a poor vector if he wants to see much of the System. He could also be trying for a slight course correction by pa.s.sing close to the sun; we'll know that better when we get more accurate readings on him. It's even possible the Intruder doesn't yet know we're here. At the speed he's making, the sun's light is blue-s.h.i.+fted into the ultraviolet, and he might not have the proper instruments to detect it.”

”Unlikely,” Dr. Louis Du Bellay of the Chiron Inst.i.tute murmured. ”I would guess they've done this before.”

”Agreed, Doctor,” Carey nodded. ”It's a very remote possibility. Well. The Intruder, then, is not likely to be of great danger to us, provided we keep local traffic out of his way. By the same token, he's not likely to advance our store of knowledge significantly, either. With one exception: we now know we're not alone in the universe. You'll appreciate, I'm sure, the importance of not springing this revelation on the System and colonies without some careful thought on the part of all of us. Thank you for coming here; we'll keep you informed.”

Carey stepped from the lectern and headed toward the door as his audience came alive with a buzz of intense conversation. As Carey pa.s.sed him, Dr. Du Bellay rose and fell into step. ”Would you mind if I tagged along with you back to the Situation Room, General?” he asked. ”I'd like to keep close tabs on this event.”

Carey nodded. ”I rather expected you'd want to. I've already had you cleared for entry.” He raised his hand warningly as the Security man reached for the spy-seal control. ”No talking about this, Doctor, until we're past the inner security s.h.i.+eld.”

It was only a short walk to the central section of Peacekeeper Headquarters, and the two men filled the time by discussing Du Bellay's latest trip to the ancient ruins at Van Maanen's Star. ”I heard about that,”

Carey said. ”I understand it was your first solo tachs.h.i.+p run.”

”Yes. The Directorate at Chiron's been encouraging everyone to learn to fly*it's cheaper than always having to hire a pilot along with a tachs.h.i.+p. Fortunately, they haven't yet suggested I do all my own digging as well.”

Carey chuckled. ”That's what students are for. Are those ruins really as extensive as people say?”

”Even more so. We've barely scratched the surface, and there's at least one more civilization under the one we're working on.”They pa.s.sed the security s.h.i.+eld to the clickings of invisible security systems, and the topic abruptly changed. ”How in blazes did a tachs.h.i.+p stumble across something moving that fast?” Du Bellay asked.

”Pure dumb luck,” Carey said. ”A merchantman coming in from Alpha Centauri had dropped back into normal s.p.a.ce to do a navigational check. They'd just finished when this thing went roaring past.”

”They're lucky they weren't fried by the ramscoop fields,” Du Bellay commented.

”They d.a.m.n near were. A few million kilometers over and they probably would have been. Anyway, they recovered from the shock and got a preliminary reading on his course. Then they jumped ahead the shortest distance they could and waited the sixteen minutes it took the Intruder to catch up. They got another decimal in his course, confirmed he was heading toward Sol, and hightailed it here with the news.”

”Hmm. Ironic, isn't it, that the great search for intelligent life should be ended by a puddle-jumping business whip whose navigator didn't trust his own computer. Well, what's next?”

”We've sent out a dozen tachs.h.i.+ps, strung along the Intruder's route, to get better data. They should be reporting in soon.”

The Peacekeeper Situation Room was a vast maze of vision screens, holotanks, and computer terminals, presided over by a resident corps of officers and technicians. Halfway across the room was the main screen, currently showing a map of the entire solar system. From its lower right-hand corner a dotted red line speared into the inner system.

A young captain glanced up from a paper-strewn table as they approached. ”Ah, General, he greeted Carey. ”Just in time, sir: Chaser data's coming in.”

”Let's see what you've got, Mahendra.”

Mahendra handed him a computer-printed page. Carey scanned it, aware that Du Bailey was reading over his shoulder.

The Intruder was big. Compensating for relativistic effects and the difficulty of taking data at such speeds, the computer judged the alien craft at well over fifteen hundred meters long, two hundred meters in diameter, and ma.s.sing near the two-hundred-million-ton mark. Its cone-shaped ramscoop fields spread out hundreds of kilometers in front of it. The drive spectrum showed mainly helium, but with a surprisingly high percentage of other elements.

Behind him, Du Bellay whistled softly. ”Talk about your basic Juggernaut! Where'd it come from?”

”We've backtracked him to the 1228 Circini system,” Mahendra said, referring to one of his sheets. ”He didn't originate there, though*it's a dead system. We're trying to track him further back.”

Carey looked up at the main screen. ”Why isn't the Intruder's course projected beyond Sol?”

Mahendra frowned. ”I don't know, sir.” He swung a keyboard over and typed something. ”The projection stopped when the course intersected the sun,” he reported, frowning a bit harder.

”What?” Du Bellay said.

”Show us the inner system,” Carey ordered.

Mahendra punched a key and the screen changed, now showing only out to Mars. Sure enough, thedotted line intersected the edge of the dime-sized image of the sun. Without being told to, Mahendra jumped the scale again, and the sun filled the screen.

Carey squinted at it. ”Almost misses. How dense is the stuff he'll hit?”

”The computer says about ten to the minus seventh grams per cc. Not much by Earth standards, but that's almost a hundred trillion times anything in the interstellar medium. And he'll pa.s.s through several thousand kilometers of it.”

”Like h.e.l.l he will,” Carey winced. ”He'll burn to a crisp long before that. I was right after all, Doctor*he hasn't noticed the solar system's in his path.”

He glanced at Du Bellay, then paused for a longer look. The archaeologist was frowning into s.p.a.ce.

”Doctor?”

”Captain, does that console have DatRetNet capability?” Du Bellay asked. ”Please look up data on that star you mentioned*1228 Circini. Cross-reference with unusual stellar activity.”

Mahendra nodded and turned to the console. ”Something wrong?” Carey asked Du Bellay. The other's expression worried him.

”I don't know. I seem to remember hearing about that star a few years ago....” He trailed off.

”Got it, Doctor,” Mahendra spoke up.

Both Du Bellay and Carey leaned over to look at the console screen. ”I was right,” Du Bellay said in a graveyard voice, pointing at the third paragraph.

” 'Planetary studies indicate a giant solar flare occurred approximately one hundred years ago, causing extensive melting patterns as far out as one point eight A.U.,' ” Carey read aloud. ” 'Such behavior in a red dwarf is unexplainable by current theory.' I don't see the connec*” He broke off in mid-sentence.

Du Bellay nodded grimly. ”1228 Circini is ninety-six light-years away. It's too close to be coincidence.”

”Are you suggesting the Intruder deliberately rammed 1228 Circini? That's crazy!”

Du Bellay merely nodded at the main screen. Carey gazed up at the dotted line for a long minute. Then he tapped Mahendra's shoulder. ”Captain, get me Executor Nordli. Priority Urgent-One.”

Orofan woke to hear the last wisp of sound from his intercommunicator. He reached for the control, noting with some surprise that the shading of the muted wall light indicated half past cin*he'd been asleep less than an aarn.

”Yes?”

It was Pliij. ”s.h.i.+pmaster, we have a problem. You'd best come up immediately.”

Was something wrong with his s.h.i.+p? ”I'll be right there.”

Pliij was not alone when Orofan arrived on the bridge. La.s.sarr was also there. ”Greetings, Voyagemaster,” Orofan said, giving the required salute even as his eyes darted around the room. No problem was registering on any of the displays.”The trouble is not with the Dawnsent,” Voyagemaster La.s.sarr said, interpreting Orofan's actions and expression with an ease the s.h.i.+pmaster had never liked.

”Then what is it?”

”Here, s.h.i.+pmaster.” Pliij manipulated a control and an image, relativistically compensated, appeared on a screen. ”This is the system we're approaching. Look closely here, and here, and here.”

Tiny flecks of light, Orofan saw. The spectrometer read them as hot helium....

Orofan felt suddenly cold all over. Fusion-drive s.p.a.cecraft! ”The system is inhabited!” he hissed.