Non-fiction Assignment

Fiction Assignment

Posted: Dec 10 12:34:56

Bitsong

The passenger of the sky-blue utility van with the Pro-Tek logo, which
pulled up to the PORTICO of the well groomed country estate, had a mission
to perform.. Massive bronze gates slowly swung open for the expected
visitor,  then closed behind it with a ponderous clang. The van cruised up
the serpentine driveway, beneath the entertwining branches of century old
maples. Their cooling shade gave welcome relief from the fierce afternoon
sun.

A nomadic summer breeze carried the scent of freshly cut timothy, oiled
leather and fresh horse manure from the well-tended barns. It ruffled the
brilliant flowers surrounding  the entrance to the gracious old ante-bellum
mansion. The portly middle-aged matron, in the back of the van, was
completely immune HALCYON setting of the peace and beauty of the
surrounding vista.
"Just let me off at the front door, Andrew. You needn't wait. I'll have
Carol drive me home after dinner." Her snow white hair, blue tinged and
upswept in the current fashion, ruffled in the sultry zephyr, as she
descended and entered the house.
Elfriede Rosenhof was a RAPACIOUS,  determined woman. This visit to her
daughter was a critical step in repairing a vital strand in her web woven
over years of meticulous planning.
As she entered the cool living room, a young lady  rose nervously with a
drink in her hand and ran to meet her. "Oh! Mama what am I going to do?
Rolf is furious with me. He hasn't been back all week.  I've called Alex,
even he doesn't know where he is and his shuttle launches tomorrow."
"Poor Fool! It's worse than that you little idiot! He's already initiating
action for a legal separation"
She shook her head in disgust. "Not only do you shack up with the man's
own gardener, you do it here in his own house. You and your VORACIOUS
appetite for sex. How could you have been so damn stupid? Surely all the
servants have to know what's been going on." She shook her well COIFED head
in wonderment.  "Carol, some of them are third generation Van Eckersham
retainers, Hell, they are more loyal to the family name than to Rolf
himself"
She eyed her daughter with contempt. "And, in his own bedroom! It's bad
enough for you to be risking our future, just to cool your pants, but you
reall had to rub his nose in it. Didn't you?"
"Oh! It's not as bad as all that, Mom. Jim tells me that even if he gets a
divorce, I'll still get the fattest alimony check you ever saw. There was
no pre-nuptial agreement, I'll get half of the community property."
"Who, in hell is Jim? Another of your play mates?"
"No, he's just a very close friend, and he's also a lawyer."
Carol, will you stop screwing us up. Rolf won't be going for a
divorce.  He'll be going for an annulment, you know you Anita marrie! 
You've never been married.  It never happened. You'll get zip."
"They can't do that! I've got the papers, the pregnancy, the miscarriage.
Too many things have happened for him to get an annulment. Down deep he
really loves me."
"Look, you little fool! I've learned a lot since then, I wasn't as careful
then as I should have been. I had to work for six months just to get him to
screw you, even then I had to dope him up. If they really check on things,
my only chance is that 'Spanish Fly' is such an old drug that it's dropped
out of the data bases."
She took the drink from Carol's shacking hand, "The least you could do now
is to get me one of these too."
She drained the glass, as Carol poured another for each of them. "They
still have blood samples on file," she continued. "There was the pregnancy
we faked so that our honorable 'Dudley-Do-Right would do right by our
little Nell'. Those tests are still in the records, The same goes for the
miscarriage that kept you in the hospital for a week."
 She accepted the refill and continued, "All of those things were good
enough to fool a young fool trying to do the 'honorable thing' and protect
his family name, I doubt if they would stand up under a thorough
investigation."
"If it's that bad mama, what are we going to do?"
"You're going keep your damn legs crossed, for as long as necessary, until
I can achieve a FAIT ACCOMPLI. After the accident, you will play the
grieving young widow until they settle the estate. Then you can get rid of
some old timers here and I can clean out the files."
*******************
Lord Sidney Brach glanced down at the report he had just received. He
thought, It looks like Excel-lnt are trying to play hard ball. I can't
prove it yet but it's got to be they who are behind these attacks. The
slim, ageless man, ran an impatient hand through the thick mat of his gray
streaked hair, then reclined as far as possible in his high-backed judge's
chair. He locked his hands behind his head and stretched, then stared
thoughtfully at odd looking combination in front of him.
An ITINERANT sunbeam had broken through the haze of scudding clouds. It
momentarily accented the high cheekbones and aquiline nose of Alex
Rappaport's angular RAPTORIAL face, and highlighted the features of the
small furry alien seated on his shoulder. In spite of Alex's English name,
short blond hair and blue eyes, there could be no doubt of the American
Indian heritage hidden within his genes. His level gaze locked with those
of this industrial giant of twenty-second century space operations.
"Alex, I'm sorry to have to drag you in here just before your launch, but
the situation is SUI GENRES, right now. Until we can check things out, I
don't trust any form of remote communications. I need to explain our sudden
change of plans so that you will know what is happening."
"It's all right, Sir, my copilot, finally showed up. Rolf is handling the
preflight, he's still as green as grass, but he knows it and goes
completely by the book. He's more thorough than I am."
"By the way, I have never met your alien friend, is this the gentle being
I've heard so much about?"
"Your Lordship, I may present Aharau." Alex's stern mouth relaxed in an,
almost boyish grin. "He has a string of additional names, but you pronounce
Aharau like the sound of a dog yawning, and the rest of them are worse. I
almost dislocated my jaw the last time I tried to say them. Anyway he is a
respected leader on Xlopo, where he saved my life. Right now he's my
constant companion. We seem to have created a SYMBIOSIS, he will remain
under my AEGIS until I can return him to his home world."
In spite of the INCONGRUITY of the situation, Sidney Brach nodded gravely
to the cat-sized alien with a translator box strapped to his chest and his
long prehensile tail firmly wrapped around Alex's neck. "I heard of what
you did on Xlopo, Aharau, and certainly welcome you to this meeting."
Although his pronunciation was phonetically correct, it lacked the
plaintive lilt that Alex had achieved.
The deep resonance of the voice emerging as translated words, was in
shocking contrast to what would be expected from a being of Aharau's size.
"I am honored, Your Lordship, Friend Alex has explained your unique status,
and the purposes of your project. I shall endeavor to assist wherever I
can."
With the formalities over, Brach turned to Alex. "I hate to ask this of any
man but we've lost the last three loads of supplies going up to the work
crews on the Haven. Two of them were blasted right out of the skies, the
other was crippled but made it back down. If I don't get a shipment of air
and water up to them soon, they will be in real trouble."
"I'll certainly do what I can, Sir, but at the rate we have been hauling
supplies to them, I would have thought that with recyclers and all, the
RAMIFICATION would give them they would have plenty. After all, isn't it
supposed to be a self contained, closed environment when you ship her out
to the belt?"
"That's still six to nine months in the future, right now it's all inside a
two hundred million cubic foot shell, which still leaks like a sieve."
He picked up a note from his desk and RUMINATED for a few second as he
formed the next question. " How well do you know Elfrede Rosenhoff?"
"Only indirectly, She's our chief programmer, I can't say that I like her,
but she seems very competent."
"Well, she believes that whoever is attacking our shuttles has a direct
link feeding them our launch parameters. If that's the case they can
pre-calculate exactly where and when to hit the ships. She came up with a
quite clever suggestion."
Brach idly scratched the end of his nose. "Your shuttle is being fed the
data for a later window, and a non-optimum intercept course to the Haven.
It will look like we are trying to change our launch pattern. We also have
a fighter posed. It will use your identification codes. It, not you, will
launch on those parameters. You will stay on your original schedule.
Alex thoughtfully gnawed his lower lip. "Sounds like a good plan. At those
speeds he must be committed to his attack long before he can make visual
identification. With the missiles he is using his attack envelope will be
so narrow, he'll be flying right down the barrel of that fighter's gun.
"You will go ahead and plan to launch on your normal minimum energy
trajectory. Since the link is suspect, Elfrede will hand-carry a disk to
you with your actual time and other launch data."
How about launch and flight communications protocols?
"That's why I selected you for this job, you are an experienced cosmic
explorer. You should have no difficulty in handling this launch without
communications feedback. Oh, you will need it to rendezvous with the Haven,
but by then it will make no difference."
He glanced at his watch, "But, you need to get to the launch site. I'll
take you there and tell you the rest on the way. We had better get going."
************************
 "It always feels strange," remarked Alex "Here we are, going down into the
earth to get into orbit."
Sidney Brach grinned. "Yes, are dropping into the tube of a two mile long
electro-cannon. Actually we are also in the shaft leading down to the
nuclear power plant that drives it."
Alex looked around at the circular platform surrounded by an expanded metal
cage. As it settled slowly into the Earth, he could hear a continuous sigh
of rushing air, a gargantuan dragon stirring in its sleep. "Electro-cannon".
 
When I first came here, that was a new one on me. I couldn't believe you
could shoot your payloads into orbit."
 "Not quite, this is more like a reusable form of the first two stages of
boosters. It cuts about 85 percent of the cost per pound of material thrown
into orbit. Any energy we put into the system without increasing the
throw-weight is practically free,"
Alex walked to the edge of the sinking platform and stared through the
cage. He could feel the flow of air as the gigantic pneumatic piston
settled. This was the first time he had had an opportunity to question the
Boss. "I can see how the operating costs could drop, but how in hell could
you amortize the capital investment in this installation. You'd have to
have thousands of launches to even make a dent in that."
 "This installation turned out to be one of the last nuclear fission sites
we ever built. It was going to be cut into the World Power Grid. However,
when fusion power became available, they couldn't cut off fission plants
fast enough."
 "Yes I remember part of that. Over the years, several nuclear disasters
had occurred, one of them was a complete melt-down."
 "Pro-Tek plants were safe, that's why we got the contracts, but the world,
at large, had developed such an irrational fear of nuclear power. Safe or
not, if an alternative was available, they wanted no part of nuclear
fission. Anyway, we ended up owning this site as part of the LIQUIDATED
damage settlements on contract cancellation."
 "In other words, you amortized the cost of the bore against the nuclear
plant, not the launches?"
Sid laughed, "That's about it. Our accountants say we're cheating, and not
looking at the real costs. You see, we only had to charge about 15 percent
of the power plant itself to the launch program."
 "You mean you got the whole power plant, reactors, generators and all?"
 "Not quite, we were about 80 percent complete when they shut us down. We
salvaged a smaller-than-scheduled fusion plant out of it, around five
hundred megawatts. It's enough to power this launcher. It replaces the
first stage for the equivalent of over a hundred tons of throw weight into
orbit."
 "What sort of thrust does it give?"
 "We can program that into the timing of the pulses. I think, if they are
carrying passengers, they try for about four gees, anyway it boosts the
payload and any subsequent stages to about mach one-point-five on exit."
 "But, that's almost instantaneous power delivery, pure surge energy. Those
generators have to be on line, spinning and up to speed. Doesn't it cost a
lot to keep the plant on standby between launches?"
 We can divert the full output of the station to each launch. Since we sell
the rest of the power to the grid, it's the most cost-effective way of
boosting massive loads for..."
He never finished, as the platform stopped with a soft bump. Hydraulic rams
pushed it off to the side exposing a glimpse of the nose of their launch
vehicle in the bore below.
As the platform came to rest, Alex remarked, "Well it looks like we are
ready to go there's Rolf waiting for us."
 As he hurried to meet the descending group, Rolf Van Ekersham's usual
boyish grin had become a serious frown.
 "Hi Rolf, you know Sir Sidney, I believe."
"Oh yes we've been part of the same CLIQUE for quite a while., Hello Sid.  
I tried to contact you but they wouldn't put me through."
"Why, is something wrong?"
"I'm not sure, but, I've learned to distrust anything my, soon to be ex,
mother-in-law law is connected with. I'd like to borrow Aharau's bitsong
ability and have him listen to our computers code stream."
He looked at the small alien sitting on Alex's shoulder. "You said that
each program was a symphony in it's own right and that you had memorized
the song of the flight profile?"
"That is not quit correct friend Rolf, I hear the melody the code creates,
the tonal patterns and all. I haven't memorized the details of the bit
streams. Why may I ask?"
"I would like you to listen to the new program I just entered and tell me
if it sounds right."
Alex broke in, "You got the disk? Elfriede brought  the new launch
parameters didn't she?"
"Yes, but she didn't bring it, she sent Carol."
Lord Brach frowned, "Why did she do that? She was supposed to hand-carry
that disk herself."
"Carol said Elfrede had a TIA, and is in the hospital."
Alex interjected, "What the hell is a TIA?  Sounds like movie -land jargon
for a skin show."
"No, I had to look it up myself. Let me see if I can remember, it stands
for Transient Ischemeric Attack. It's sometimes called a short stroke,
lasts for twenty of thirty minutes then clears up. I checked, she is in the
hospital all right, but that's all they will tell me."
He smiled bitterly, "It seemed that Carol was more interested in mending
fences than in delivering the disk."
"But, you do have the disk?"
"Yes, I put in the data, then ran our internal diagnostics and even made a
rough manual calculation a cross check. Everything seems to be Okay. But, I
would like Aharau to listen to it, I don't trust anything Elfrede has had a
hand in."
"Well the window opens in thirty-two minutes, we had better get suited up.
We'll run a final cross check, just before blast off. He can check it out
then. You know we have to do this without ground control feed back, don't
you?"
"God no! Why is that?"
"I'll tell you about while we get suited up."
Alex turned to Lord Brach, "Good-By, Your Lordship, I'll see you in a
couple of weeks."
********************
Carol Van Ekersham, hurried down the sterile green corridor and, having
gotten the number from the night nurse at the desk of the Neurology Ward,
quietly entered Elfrede's room. "Mother, how are you feeling? You gave me
quite a fright."
"Honey, a TIA is the easiest thing in the world to fake, all you have to do
is know the symptoms. There is no way to get caught. Over half of the TIAs
just clear up on their own and leave no trace."
"Why didn't you warn me?"
" You aren't a good enough actress. You have to seem worried about me when
you talked to Rolf, and it had to show."
"I don't understand, what good would that do?"
"Look, I've got a perfect alibi, who is going to suspect a hospitalized,
feeble old stroke victim of having any thing to do with a space shuttle
blowing up after it leaves the atmosphere?"
"You never told me that was going to happen! That makes me a party to
whatever you are planning."
"Don't worry. I had to break the thread or things could get too obvious. As
it is, they will keep me here and run cat-scans and every other test they
can imagine. Then, when they can't find anything, they will probably just
give me a prescription for a blood thinner and discharge me. I'll probably
get an apology for their not being able to locate the blood clot that
caused the trouble in the first place."
********************
 As the g-forces gradually shifted from his chest to the seat of his pants,
Alex mused, "You know, Rolf I don't think I'll ever get used to this launch
profile. First that electro-cannon whaps you with four g's with almost no
buildup, then just when you get used to that, the reverse thrusters on the
launch cradle cut in to transfer its momentum to us, and we hit an
atmosphere, which is like a brick wall at these speeds."
"What's wrong with that Captain? It's all I've ever known."
"I guess that the sequence is so different from the profile we use on
exploration missions. It just doesn't seem right."
"Friend Alex," the deep resonance of Aharau's translator box cut in.
"Everything does not seem to be all right. There is something wrong."
Alex stiffened in his seat. He had learned to trust the diminutive alien.
"Why do you say that Aharau?"
"I have been listening to the bitsong of your launch program. It seemed
correct at launch but there is a DISSIDENCE, a discord, creeping in to it.
It is changing in a pattern which I have never heard before."
"Can you describe it? When and how does it occur?"
"There seem to be several factors involved. One is most pronounced is when
you change the fuel ratio to your ram jets. You haven't gone on rocket
power yet, so you haven't used oxygen.  But the timing synchronization
between your Hydrogen and Oxygen feeds seems to be drifting. If the
mixtures are not properly adjusted, could that not cause an explosion?"
"If we have an oxygen rich mixture it could flash back and explode in the
turbo pumps. It could kill us."
"Rolf, we are due to go on rocket power when we hit the new window, How
long do we have."
"One minute-thirty-two seconds, Alex. We are already locked for automatic
injection into high orbit."
"Punch up the fuel ratio diagnostic, that's Command 304!"
"He's right! Cut the power!  If that oxygen cuts in,  well blow sky high
within two minutes."
"The control valves are frozen. They won't move!"
There was a roar as the main rockets fired in an uneven rumble.
"Oh Shit it's too late"
"Cut all power! Go to manual override and prepare to abort!"
"Mayday, Mayday Mayday Damn! Our communications are dead!"
*************************
It took Carol a few moments for the pattern of things to sink in. 
"Accident! A grieving young widow! A space shuttle blowing up after it 
leaves the atmosphere. My God mother!  You're behind this whole thing! 
If anybody finds out, we are both dead. And,  you just pulled me into 
the middle of it!  Oh, mom how could you?
"Don't worry girl I've got this backed up so deeply they will never get to u=
s."
"How do you mean?"
 Elfriede had a FETISH for enumeration. She held up one finger. "First that
shuttle will blow up after the main engine burns long enough to keep any
debris from returning to earth. It will be blamed on the pirates which have
been knocking off Pro-Tek's other ships."
She held up another finger, "Second,  Even if that fails, the pirates
themselves have the coordinates and the timing of the window. They are
being paid to keep any thing from reaching the Haven."
 "And, finally." She smiled slyly. "If all else fails, I have a patsy set
up to take the fall. He doesn't know it but Elmer has a foreign bank
account. It has received a substantial deposit after each attack, In
addition I have a sneak circuit into his files. All my records of these
missions are stored in his private cache. Unfortunately, he will recognize
the file name but has forgotten the access code. Why even the disk you gave
Rolf is a brand that only he uses. And, the virus was over written on one
of his old programs."
*******************
Alex Rapport looked down at his shaking hands. " Aharau, thanks to your
bitsong warning we are safe, for now anyway. But, we still got problems."
A white faced Rolf looked over at his first pilot. "What the hell happened?
I followed your orders but I still don't know what it is all about."
"I suspect Elfrede wanted to make your wife a widow. She is your mother-in
-law isn't she? Well, let's take stock of where we are. Our main thruster
is obviously gone, and the burn wasn't long enough to bring us into a
synchronous orbit.  We'll be in some form of elliptical orbit around Earth.
I don't think that we are in any danger of burning up in the atmosphere, at
least for now."
"How do you know that, Alex?"
"I don't for sure, It's just a feeling I have about orbital mechanics. But,
we had better check it out. Our inertials should have tracked what
happened, call up the vectors and see what the computer has to say."
"Okay, but we've lost all thrust, what do we do?"
"We still have our verniers and control thrusters. The problem is, do we
have the fuel to kill off our orbital energy. We still have to get back to
Earth."
"But Boss that, power surge, or the virus,  killed our auto-pilot and
control servos we don't have any controls."
"If we can kill enough energy, and hit the atmosphere at the right angle,
we should be able to bring her in by the seat of our pants."
"But, this thing will fly like a rock, we can never manhandle those
controls through reentry."
"Got a better idea, kid? I'm all ears. But first, jettison those main
fuel tanks and let's EXPUNGE 'em  and get them away from us. After that
turbo blew up, I don't trust any of that tankage back there. Even in a
vacuum, if hydrogen and oxygen mix, we could still be crisped."
***************************
The last thing in the world that Elmer Maralboro wanted was to make waves,
especially those which would call attention to himself. He could feel his
knees shaking as he addressed Sir Sidney Brach.
"Your Lordship!  I'm sorry to bother you but I don't know who else to
trust, and you seem to be the one most affected."
"That's what I'm here for Elmer. What's the problem?"
"Something strange is going on, which has something to do with those
shuttles you lost,  and I seem to be in the middle of it.  I have no idea
of what it is or why I seem to be involved. But, if it affects the shuttle
flights I thought you would be interested."
"I certainly am, but could we start at the beginning?"
"Okay, I was purging my data base of some obsolete files when I came on one
I barely remembered, However It didn't respond to my access code.  I used
to be a hacker, so I dugout my old 'CROWBAR' program and broke in." He
pulled out several pages of print out,  "This is what I found. It seems
to be all the flight data and orbital parameters not only of those shuttles
you lost but also of one which is going on right now. "
"Where did they come from?"
"I don't have the foggiest idea, Sir. Someone put them there, I don't who,
or how. Maybe, someone who knows the master program could trace it back,
but I doubt it. I don't know who to trust so I've been afraid to ask
anyone."
"I can bring someone in from the outside to check it out."
"But, that isn't all. If you will look at the end here is the address and
phone number of an off-shores bank, and an account number. I called the
Bank the account is in my name!"
************************
Lord Brach leaned back on the sofa and took a long sip of his drink. You
know Alex, if she hadn't gotten greedy she might have pulled it off."
"Why is that Sir?" Alex leaned over and grabbed a handful of peanuts which
he shared with, Aharau.
"When your fuel tanks blew up after you jettisoned them. The explosion was
at about the right time and place for her virus to have worked."
"Well they sure blew all right."
"Then, when you could bring the shuttle down in the Sahara desert, nobody
knew that anything had ever happened. As far as she was concerned you were
dead."
He signaled the white jacketed waiter for a refill.
"She, had the TEMERITY to decide she didn't need Elmer as a patsy any more
and tried to erase the data she had planted in his files, and to withdraw
the funds she had deposited in his name. We caught her at both places, that
closed the door. Otherwise, we could have suspected what happened but never
proved it."
He turned to the small alien, who for once was not on Alex's shoulder.
"Aharau, your bitsong really saved the day."