Huber locked his faceshield down and cued it to the imagery Tranter’s probe was picking up. He had no context for what he was looking at: a series of chips were set in a board bracketed between iridium bulkheads. On the bottom of the board was an additional chip, attached to the circuits on the other side with hair-fine wires.
“Hang on, I’ve got the catalog,” Edlinger replied. They were using lapel mikes because their commo helmets were too bulky for some of the spaces they were slipping into. “Can you give me more magnification? Are those two reds, a blue and a . . .”
“Purple and white, chief,” Tranter said. “The fourth line’s a purple and white.”
“Roger that,” said Edlinger. “A simple control circuit, sonny. Probably made on Sonderby, wouldn’t you say?”
A dozen chips flashed up on Huber’s faceshield beside the real-time image, matches that the chief’s AI had found in a catalog of parts and equipment. They could’ve been yea many mirror images as far as Huber could tell, but the techs and their electronics apparently found minute differences among them.
“Galieni said he’d been trained on Sonderby,” Edlinger added in a somber voice. “I don’t doubt that he was, but I’d be willing to bet that it wasn’t Southern Cross Spacelines that hired him when he left school.”
The original image blanked as Sergeant Tranter squirmed back out of the equipment bay. Huber raised his faceshield as the chief walked around from the other side of the car.
“All right,” said Huber. “What does it do? Is it a bomb?”
“It isn’t a bomb, El-Tee,” Tranter said, squatting for a moment before he got to his feet. “It’s a control circuit, and it’s been added to the air defense board. It’s got an antenna wire out through the chanel for the running lights—that’s how I noticed it.”
“They could’ve set it to switch off the guns when somebody sent a coded radio signal, Huber,” Edlinger added. “That’s the most likely plan, though it depends on exactly where on the board they were plugged in. I’m not sure we can tell with just the maintenance manuals I’ve got here.”
“I’ve got a better guess than that, Buck,” Huber said, standing and feeling his gut contract. “Shutting the guns off wouldn’t be a disaster if it just affected one car in a platoon. What if that chip locked all three tribarrels on full automatic fire in the middle of Benjamin? What do you suppose would happen to the houses for a klick in every direction?”
“Bloody hell,” Tranter muttered.
Huber nodded. “Yeah, that’s exactly what would happen: bloody hell. And coming on top of Rhodesville, the UC government’d cancel the Regiment’s contract so fast we’d be off-planet with our heads swimming before we knew what happened.”
The technicians looked at one another, then back to Huber. “What do we do now, El-Tee?” Tranter asked.
“Have you disconnected the chip?” Huber asked.
“You bet!” Tranter said with a frown of amazement. “I cut both leads as soon as I saw them. Whatever the thing was, I knew it didn’t belong.”
“Then we shut things up and I go talk to Major Steuben in the morning,” Huber said. “I’d do it now, but—”
He grinned with wry honesty.
“—not only do I think it’ll keep, I don’t think I’m in any shape to talk to the major before I’ve had a good night’s sleep.”
Sergeant Tranter rubbed the back of his neck with his knuckles. “And maybe a stiff drink or two, hey El-Tee?” he said. “Which I’m going to share with you, if you don’t mind.”
“I’m buying for both of you for what you’ve done tonight,” Huber said, thinking of the coming interview. “And I just wish you could carry it the rest of the way with the major, but that’s my job. . . .”
* * *
Major Steuben wasn’t available through the regimental net at dawn plus thirty, at noon, or at any of the other times Huber checked for him into mid afternoon. Huber didn’t leave a message—he was sure Steuben would learn about the calls as soon as he wanted to know—and it didn’t even cross his mind to talk to some other member of the White Mice. Little as Huber liked the major, this was no time to bring a subordinate up to speed on the problem. He began to wonder if he was going to reach Steuben before 1800 hours, close of business for the regular staff.