“Andy Corwen,” Jim said. A man who was visibly brimming with the extraordinary self-deluding self-importance of the professional, network newsreader.
“Here’s the way it is for the fifteenth day of January, ’24. The headline story is the fire at the Felix Turner Hospital in Shreveport, Louisiana. Latest figures put deaths at forty-two, with many more missing. Local fire chief Randall Meissen says first indications are that the fire may have suspicious origins. The Presidential primaries will shortly be opening in New Hampshire with little change in the opinion polls. The homicide of alleged Mafia hitman Larry ‘Bookman’ Giacomo in San Bernardino last night is believed by police to be part of an ongoing feud between warring families.”
“Can’t wait to get back home to all this death and violence,” said Marcey Cortling. “Two years away and nothing changes.”
The taped news bulletin was continuing.
“Vid rock superstars the Mutant Scum Legion continue to break all venue records in their tour of the Bible Belt, while also outraging the Mothers of Moral Rectitude. Conference championships this coming Sunday, building toward Superbowl in San Diego in two weeks. Federal intervention has today been threatened in…”
“He never told us which teams are through,” moaned Jed Herne. “What an asshole!”
“… dispute which has already lasted five months and brought the nation’s capital grinding to a halt. Heavy snows are forecast across the Pacific Northwest in the next twenty-four hours. Finally an item of international news. The fundamentalist military government of Kurdistan has complained to the World National Council over alleged outrages in their border conflict with southern Iraq. There are unsubstantiated claims of chemical and ecological warfare using agrarian toxins. And that’s how it is.”
There was a loud, final click as the tape reached its end.
Jim Hilton looked around at the rest of the crew. “Doesn’t sound like the last bulletin before the horsemen of the apocalypse come galloping in with the final curtain, does it?”
Kyle Lynch spoke for everyone. “Just sounded normal to me. No clues at all.”
“Usual crap. No reason for us to get cut off up here.” Ryan O’Keefe shook his head. “Nothing at all.”
But they were all wrong.
Chapter Five
Henderson McGill was Jim Hilton’s oldest friend on the Aquila. They’d come through basic training in the same year, after Mac’s transfer from university, and they’d both been out into deep space a number of times.
Now they sat together in the ship’s small astrophysics laboratory. On the wall behind the captain the repeater clock showed that they would be coming up to reentry in less than two hours, with the projected landing back at the USAF base a little under six hours off.
The strain of the past day and night was showing on Jim Hilton’s face, and he rubbed at his bloodshot eyes. “Jesus, I’ve had it.”
“You manage any sleep?”
Jim gave him a wan smile. “Sure. I reckon I managed all of nine seconds. You?”
“I figure I must’ve dozed for a couple of hours during the night.”
“So we head for burn-up at noon. Sounds like one of those cheapo-cheapo vid productions that Lori was always appearing in. Burn-up at Noon.”
McGill was rolling a blunt pencil between finger and thumb. “We had twenty-four hours to come up with an answer, Jim.”
“We don’t even have much of a guess, never mind anything like an answer.”
The older man sniffed. “You turned me on years ago to that Victorian detective guy. You remember? Sherlock Holmes?”
“Sure. Moriarty and going over the falls. Elementary, my dear McGill. What about him?”
“He said something like, when you had a problem, after you’ve eliminated all the sensible possibilities, then what you’ve got left, however stupid, has to be the solution.”
“Problem’s easy as can be, Mac. Mission went well. We all go back into the sleepers. While we’re out something happens. Bob Rogers goes off on the last flight west.” He hesitated. “Poor bastard. Communications folded its tent into the night and stole away.”
“Nice image, Jim. Should’ve been a poet instead of a starship commander.”
“Sure. No clues. No radio response anywhere on Earth. So, logic says something has to be wrong….I mean really very wrong, Mac, back home.”