
It was a quiet day on Horizon’s command centre. Admiral Jane Mulgrew liked those days. But didn’t trust them.
On a normal day there would be something. One of the two governors being a pain in the neck, jurisdictional disputes that needed settling, Harpy ambassadors complaining about something, or informing her of something else.
Ever since Hylia had passed away, with the express wish to be cremated on Horizon, and treated like a human, as she was part of the ecosystem on board, as she had put it, there was a permanent ambassador from the Harpies.
Jane had soon seen the pro’s of that.
Now Horizon had access to Harpy transponder signals, like the human IFF signals, in order to weed out any potential patriarchist ships approaching.
There was a ship docked at what remained of beta, functioning like a sensor beacon, boosting the long range scan capabilities of Horizon.
According to the treaty she had helped draft, there was to be no exchange of technologies, especially from the Harpies to the humans, but using the Harpy ship to function as an extension to Horizon’s sensors was within the treaty regulations, and even suggested by the matriarchy.
“Ma’am?” Jane felt a glimmer of hope that the quietness would find an end as her first officer approached her. “Next week’s duty roster.” Derek Harvey handed her a tablet. Hope faded away.
“Thank you.” She sighed, looked over the tables and nodded in approval. “And the ambassador asked for a confirmation on dinner plans.” Hope found a nice little corner to hide and disappeared completely. “Tell her that I will be joining as suggested by her office.” A group of twenty five Harpies resided on the beta ring.
Part of the garden was redesigned to their needs, their offices and quarters adjacent to them. Guards of both species stood at the entrance to their section, to ensure that nothing went awry.
Including methods to ensure the absence of any cloaked suicide patriarchists.
“Hey, anybody up for a little problem solving?” Jane sat in the mess hall munching on her lunch when the chief engineer sat down at her table, ending her lnch hour of solitude. “Any time Jake.” Shoving her lunch aside Jane was glad that her hopes had found a way out of their hiding spot, in form of the chief engineer, Jake Khaku. “We soon will enter the solar system, I’ve been doing a few calculations.” He tapped his glasses, sending her some data to her glasses. “When we will start slamming those breaks, we might encounter a wobble, due to the missing mass mid ship.” The displayed ship on her glasses started to wiggle.
“Up to a critical point.” The displayed Horizon broke apart, alpha and subalpha flying on in an odd angle to the previous heading, gamma and subgamma in another.
Although her hopes for variety had fulfilled, what broke the monotony made her long for monotony again.
Staring through the virtual devastation of Horizon at Jake, Jane knew where this was headed. And she knew she would have a hard time selling the yet unproposed idea to the governors. “You said we might encounter this problem?”
“If we redistribute mass we definitely won’t.”
“I’ve been Admiral for some time now, why hasn’t anybody ever come to me, or my predecessors with this?” Jane turned the display off. Knowing Jake, Jane could imagine what the answer would be, before he even opened his mouth.
“Because it is a possibility. It might not happen at all, but I have reviewed our course, and it takes us damn close to the Jovian monstrosity we call ES-p296. The gravitational tug we can get from that might set in motion the wobble, since we’re slowing down, we’ll be in that gravitational sphere longer, and there’s the moons!” He paused, lowering his voice. “We shouldn’t risk it. Before we enter the heliosphere of the system, we should redistribute the mass.”
“You know, Jake, that’s easy in simulations, but the governors would want to roast me on an open fire and feed me to the Harpies if I suggested it!” Tucking a strain of hair behind her ear she looked to her plate, somehow she found she wasn’t hungry anymore. “You can deal with those people? These pencil pushers want to live, and they want to arrive in one piece, don’t they? If we do not redistribute, there is the chance we might not arrive. Alive, in pieces or otherwise.”
Telling him she’d need more data, especially to present the governors with some evidence, Jane got up from her seat, left.
At least it wasn’t a dull mundane day any more. The display showed again the possible outcome of the gravitational tugs from ES-p296 and its moons.
She would have Derek draft a small memo to the governors about the subject. Convincing them to either give up parts of their rings to form a new beta ring, or share jurisdiction, even if it was for just the two years they’d need to complete their journey once inside the solar system, would not be easy.
Especially if there was a chance it might not come to the catastrophe at all.
As usual the Harpy quarters were damp, and not lit as brightly as Jane was used to. Ambassador Hylia sat at the small table they set up for receiving guests. At first there had been some confusion, regarding the name of the ambassador, but apparently Hylia was a popular name, and after the humans began referring to her as “Ambassador Hylia” and called the other one “Horizon Hylia”, confusion quieted down.
“Thank you for joining me this evening.” Computerised words reached Jane’s ears. “It is my pleasue, Ambassador. To what do I owe the honor of this meeting?”
There never was just a casual dinner with ambassador Hylia, it always had a purpose. Flashing her teeth in a Harpy smile Hylia took up a piece of fish. “There is reason to assume that Horizon is in danger.” I knew there was a catch. “From what source?” If you say structural imperfections, I just have all leverage I need to get the governors to agree to redistribution of pods.
“Patriarchists.” Stopping for a moment while chewing on a piece of sushi, Jane looked the ambassador dead in the eye.
For decades there had been no mention of them. Not once had a spy or saboteur been apprehended, or detected. “Why’s that all of a sudden?” Jane finally found words again.
“They are losing everywhere else they engage us. Your ship is the only thing they know we protect, and that is vulnerable. With your permission however, we would like to bring in a warship.”
Squinting at the Harpy at the other end of the table Jane knew that one was already in range. It shadowed Horizon, somewhere barely outside sensor range. Although that is boosted by the Harpy ship docked on beta, the ship following them probably had better sensors than the small ambassadorial ship. “If I refuse that might spell disaster for my ship, let alone the diplomatic consequences in case we make it through this alive. Correct?”
Again Hylia displayed her smile. “Why would we punish you? We would protect ourselves, meaning we all would leave, but if you survive any potential encounter with the patriarchists, we wouldn’t be cross with you.”
Lie. “In any case, ambassador, your warship would be more than welcome to follow this ship around and protect us from those who wish to harm us.” She toasted the ambassador with a glass of water.
With Horizon’s Hylia, she had once discussed alcohol amongst Harpies, discovering that they liked to drink fermented beverages, but only in moderation, and with close friends. If it hadn’t been fermented, juices of any sort were only a drink for the juvenile, the senile and celebrations.
Or to survive, if clean water was unavailable, but plenty of fruit.