Mutually Assured Destruction (21/?)

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Mem-O-Gram file user: Rear Admiral Henry Popov, UN SCSG-1

Subject: First Contact Record

Date [standardized human time]: August 28th, 1974

The viewscreens usually showed the surrounding terrain when idle, as if imitating windows. Regardless, I had the FTL shutters lowered. I didn't want to see what was outside.

Talsk was a vast expanse of what my geologists called polar desert; an inhospitable wasteland dominated by featureless ice sheets, utterly lacking in life. From space, it looked like a giant scoop of ice cream.

It seemed to have been a battlefield too; the Vanguard and its escorts detected large rings of debris orbiting the world, and my ships had suffered several impacts with minute bits of metal traveling at hypersonic velocities. While the biggest pieces were about the size of a thimble, their speed made them as dangerous as any weapon. We were forced to take one of the destroyers down; the debris would've shredded the unarmored shuttles.

It took a while for us to find a way to contact the Farsul, if there were any still alive on that ice ball. Ultimately, we settled for using a standard Federation hail to broadcast, with some tags to make it appear to be a high-level government message.

That idea was Nick's, by the way. He and some of the engineers managed to get a computer system jury-rigged so he could plug in that Kolshian he rescued. It was lucky, if darkly ironic, that the Kolshian used Federation standard data ports, and inserts that fitted the Federation standard IV tubes we had in the sick bay.

That poor creature. Nick worked night and day to jury-rig a way for it to talk to us. Thing had no mouth, no nose, nothing; only ports for data, a plug-in for food formula, a plug-in for waste and a single eye. Even when we rigged it up to a terminal that allowed for text communication, it didn't communicate with us. All it did was agree to give us the codes it held as a Federation official to contact the Farsul.

The Farsul were uneasy, at first. We landed in an anonymous patch of ice as instructed, and Farsul soldiers seemed to materialize out of the permafrost, sporting long rifles and wearing layers of what looked to be white canvas. In seconds the area was bristling with cannons, but the tensions died down when the Kolshian sent out a message of reassurance.

Now a trio of the dog-like academics were standing in a hastily prepped conference room, wrapped in layers of cold-weather gear. They had insisted that I and the Kolshian meet them alone.

The middle one, who seemed to be the leader, took point.

"You've made a mistake coming here."

Things were off to a great start. Time to explain. "Well, we came here from Aafa. We needed to figure out what to do with the Kolshian we rescued. It was decided that we went to Talsk."

Middle's eyes widened at the sight of the creature in its metal frame. "And the Kolshians were turned into… that?"

"Yes. We want to figure out how to help it." A horrible thought occured to me. "We didn't do it, we found the Kolshians like this."

He nodded. "I believe you. What were you doing on Aafa?"

"We received a distress signal from Aafa about three weeks ago. We answered to find the aftermath of a battle."

At this the three Farsul leaned forward in interest. "And you found survivors? Did you find any others?"

"Yes, but they were all… well, like this." I patted the metal frame and the creature within. "There was a confrontation, and my people were only able to rescue this one."

The middle one leaned back. "A disappointment," he said, "But expected. You were undoubtedly under stress. Did you meet the Enemy?"

"Enemy? Creepy, robotic, use rectangular ships?"

Left and Right began whispering at each other, but Middle waved his hand at them and they quieted down. Middle's voice seemed excited.

"You saw them? Up close? And you confirmed they were mechanical in nature?"

Middle seemed to realize something. He stepped back and smoothed out his clothes.

"Apologies. We haven't met each other properly. We don't really do… greetings. I apologize for appearing rude. I believe we need introductions."

So we introduced ourselves properly. The middle one introduced himself as Cube. Left's name was Sum and Right's was Divisor.

"But he prefers 'Divvy' for short," said Cube drily. "Anyhow, now that we're all acquainted - what did you find of the enemy?"

I leaned back. "Erm aren't you supposed to ask-"

"-why you're here, your business, and all that?" Cube sniffed. "Evidently you're here to ask for our help; we both know this. In order for us to help you, however, we need information on your problem, which appears to be the Enemy. We both have limited time, and I recommend you refrain from asking questions we both know the answer to."

Divisor leaned on and whispered something in Cube's ear. Cube cocked his head and sighed. "Oops. Well, my colleague tells me that I might come off as offensive. I apologize if that is so. My people are hanging on by a thread. We can't waste time on niceties."

This was weird. Okay. "Well, um. Our EVA suits do have helmet cameras. We might as well review them."

…

The Farsul watched Nick's encounter intently and without comment. There was silence when the video ended. Cube stood up and turned to me, rubbing his hands together. "Well, at least that confirms some of our theories."

"Theories?"

"Yes, but they do give more questions than answers. See, we've been doing this for a long, long time."

The Vanguard shook and the ground began to rumble. Cube and his entourage swayed but otherwise stayed still; I stumbled into a nearby chair.

"Relax, relax." That was Cube, who tapped at a wrist computer with an air of impatience. "We're just lowering your ship into our hangars. We can't have you topside, sticking out like a sore thumb now, can we?"

He looked around the conference room and sniffed. "Why don't we continue this conversation in our own rooms? We have videos and media to play, and I don't want to waste time asking your people for access to your systems. Divvy here will guide you and your team when you're ready."

And with that, Cube swept out of the room, followed by Sum.

I looked at Divisor and he looked at me.

"Erm… so I assume your people like math."

Divisor nodded. "We are a race of academics, and mathematics are one of our most prestigious schools. Most of us are named after mathematical concepts. I apologize for Cube's… snooty attitude. Most of the elders are like that."

"Really? Well, I've got it cut out for me, then."

Divisor sneezed, which the translator flagged as a gesture of amusement. The Farsul stood up and made to go, assuring me he'd wait at the gangway for disembarking. Before he left, he muttered something under his breath. I only caught it because the translator did, and piped up obediently:

"If he thinks Cube's bad, wait till he meets Ratio."

…

It turns out the Federation had a liking for megastructures. Upon disembarking I found my entire carrier was sitting at the bottom of what looked like a giant missile silo. It was well-lit, but so tall that fog obscured the segmented doors at the top.

I brought along Dalek, of course, as well as Nick, who had experience with the enemy. Several security officers came with us, both human and Venlil.

A Farsul soldier waved a wand around us as we exited the hangar - probably to scan our bodies. Divisor explained it was simply a pathogen detector.

"To make sure, you know, there's nothing contagious about you," he said. I caught a tremor in his voice. Maybe the diseases they were watching for were scary. Maybe they were super vulnerable to outside pathogens. Whatever it was, he seemed spooked.

The hangar gave way to what looked like a futuristic subway station. We all got situated in a windowless train car, and soon we were on our way.

As soon as Cube verified that the car was sealed and moving, he turned to us. "Okay. All of you; what I'm about to do is for our security. You might have… knee-jerk instincts. I know we do. Please refrain from doing anything until I'm done. Okay?"

We all nodded, and he seemed satisfied.

Then he pulled out a sidearm and shot one of the Venlil guards through the head.

Gore painted the walls of the car. I felt a stinging sensation as particles of debris bit into my cheek. Dalek screamed, and the rest of the guards fumbled for their own weapons. Cube raised his paws, saying, "Hush, calm down! Look! Look!"

The guard's corpse convulsed as the nerves tried to figure out where the brain went. The entire head was gone, exploded by its own superheating amniotic fluid.

The corpse shuddered to a stop and sat completely still. Then it spasmed, and a jet of flame spurted from the cauterized trachea. Lines of fire raced down the body, tracing glowing lines under its uniform, and then it crumbled. In an instant it was a pile of ash and heated gas that made my face uncomfortably warm.

Dalek unfolded himself from where he attempted to merge with the seat. "You… didn't do that, right?"

Cube nodded grimly. "I only vaporized the head; the rest it did on its own."

He looked around at the ceiling as if searching for hidden cameras.

"I have us running in loops in an abandoned corner of our rail system. Thing is, we're all being hunted."

He tapped his wrist computer.

The ground rumbled, and this time Cube looked worried. I heard metal screeching, and we were all pulled forwards as the car ground to a stop. The lights flickered.

Cube's voice was only a whisper now.

"See, we've had reports of spies for a while now. Sleeper agents. They do their jobs, walk around, eat, sleep, converse. They're exactly the same as every other worker except that their routine medical scans picked up irregularities."

The lights went out. A viewscreen crackled to life on one of the train car's walls, showing us the outside. We were in another silo, this one darkened, the ground covered in crisscrossing tracks. Train cars similar to our own lay scattered across the silo. It was some kind of switching station, a hub. But judging from the dust on the ground, it hadn't been used in a long time.

"Their bodies contain large amounts of some kind of alien material. A material that is entirely opaque on all scans. It's like a second skin, a subdermal exoskeleton. And we couldn't see their organs inside. Maybe they don't even have organs."

I realized with a start that that's what the Farsul had been scanning us for. Not pathogens. They'd been scanning for spies.

There was buzzing, and a shaft of light cut through the dark. Dust motes flickered as the light caught them.

Silently, like whispers of linen, something floated downwards through the light. It fell as if through molasses to touch eight ribbon-like appendages to the floor.

It looked like a dark gray jellyfish, if jellyfish were the size of a large dog. Two antler-like struts jutted up and out from its spherical body, ending in bulbous spheres. It didn't walk so much as it pulled itself across the ground, as if it were in microgravity. It pulled itself low to the ground. It had no head, but I could swear it was sniffing for something. Then it pushed off, its ribbon-limbs trailing behind it like stingers. The torso slowed and the limbs fanned out, lazily drifting about as if underwater. The whole thing looked ethereal. Poisonous, even.

It jerked around, searching for something. The limbs trailed behind it, exactly like ribbons pulled through water. After a tense silence, the jellyfish felt like it had had enough. Like some kind of deep-water squid, the spider jetted back up the hole it had come from, ribbons pulling out behind.

I realized I'd been holding my breath.

"That," breathed Cube, "is a hunter."

"A hunter?"

"If the sleeper agents are spies, the hunters are their handlers. Whatever the sleepers are up to, we don't know. We haven't found any sabotage or info leaks. It's like they're just there, watching. But whenever we killed a sleeper, a hunter would show up, killing everyone in the vicinity."

"They're that dangerous?"

"Yes. There must be thousands of them, floating around in Talsk's atmosphere… we've all been forced to stay underground because of them."

"So they'd have spotted us landing?"

"Yes - that's why it was a mistake for you to come here. Your presence has compromised one of our ports." Sum sighed. I rubbed the back of my head, feeling guilty.

Cube reached over and patted my shoulder. "Well, we directed you to a port that was to be downsized anyhow. We'll be sealing it off after everything's said and done. Though your launch is going to be shaky. Besides, the info you brought back is much, much more valuable than that port. At least we can crack open the truth, even if only a little bit."

I sighed. "Shame. I suppose we'll have plenty of time to discuss it, though, right?"

"In a way, yes."

"Hm. You happen to know how long it's going to take? My crew is getting jumpy. It's be better for us to leave soon."

Cube took on a serious expression. "Oh no. You can't leave. Not anytime soon, anyway."

A thrill of fear ran down my spine. Despite everything I kept my calm. "Why?"

Cube looked at me like I hadn't figured it out yet. "Your destroyer is infested with sleepers. Your ship and its crew are under quarantine until we can verify that everything is clean."