Chapter 7: Downtime
Their small group waited in the small apartment for another few hours, passing the time with discussion and stories. Sergeant Aril in particular had some terribly graphic stories of her time in the GGI’s grand army corps. The conversation shifted at that point to other worlds in the GGI, Paulie and Aril were the only ones in their group to have ever been on another world.
Mursk’s wings fluttered a little as he stood in the corner of the unfurnished room regarding them all silently. After another moment he spoke up, “What is your home planet like then Paulie?”
Sasfren nodded her almost snake-like head. “Yes, tell us more please, especially that Yellowstone place you talked about with all the volcanoes. I have never seen a volcano myself. It is hard to imagine being able to stand so near to a hole in the ground exposing the molten guts of a world and not die.”
Paulie chuckled at that, eyes glancing down toward the dark carpeting underfoot. “Well, it isn’t like there are actual lava geysers all over the place. Most of it is just superheated springs and mud pits. If you want to see active volcanoes you need to go and visit Hawaii, that is an actual active volcanic island. Erupts all the time, I have seen videos of people’s homes getting buried under lava floes that are meters tall.” he paused, it was strange they were so excited by the idea. Must be the novelty of the thought.
He gestured to Sergeant Aril. “Are there not active geological hotspots on Gike that people can go and visit?”
She shook her head. “There are none. Gike is not a geologically active world, not like yours it seems to be anyway.”
“No protective magnetic field? Then how do compasses work? How do you survive the deadly radiation of deep space?”
Aril opened her mouth to speak but was stopped by Mursk finally stepping forward into the conversation. “I can answer that.” Their translator buzzed emotionlessly at their neck. He chittered and the speech was converted into English in Paulie’s ears. “The world of Gike orbits the gas giant of Trellan IX inside the protective envelope of its magnetic field. Its gravity protects the moon from most interstellar debris and it is this gravity that also stimulates the core of this world. With no abundance of heavy radioactive elements in the core like many terrestrial worlds the core should have fully solidified tens of millions of standard years ago. But due to the squeezing of the core from the gravitational interaction between the two bodies it remains just molten enough to produce a minimal magnetic envelope.”
Paulie’s eyebrows rose at the man’s long-winded explanation. But he supposed it made sense. “Hey, we have a moon like that in the Sol system!” He exclaimed with more enthusiasm than the situation warranted. Casting his mind back to his tenth grade science classes he recalled the facts. “Io is a moon of the gas giant world of Jupiter. It orbits close enough to Jupiter that the planet gets squished like a ball of putty and is just absolutely covered in volcanoes.” He paused, looking at Mursk suspiciously. “So how come there are no volcanoes all over Gike?”
Mursk made a flippant gesture as if the question were ridiculous. Their translator buzzed, the monotone voice answering the question in a few emotionless words. “The large subsurface ocean likely deflects much of the energy and spreads it out over the total surface of the world.”
“The what?” Paulie asked, a little lost.
“Subsurface ocean. Gike has a massive underground ocean that covers much of the world, it is filled with tunnels and large underground caverns, it is from these that life originally evolved on this world.” Sasfren answered. Mursk nodded his helmeted head, armoured lenses flashing in the light of the holoprojector image.
He shook his head. ‘Damn aliens.’ he muttered to himself silently in his head. The sound accompanied by the sound of faint laughter from his subconscious. He growled again, this time a little louder.
Jakiikii sat back into her stool a little farther. “Given the nature of his world it seems incredible to me that anything would surprise him. He told me of mountain ranges taller than the highest mountains of Gike, oceans deeper than the sky and so many other terrible and incredible things. Earth is so big and there is so much on it.” She smiled at him with her eyes and he nodded his head, still trying to understand the idea of a planet spanning subsurface ocean.
“So, does the ocean.. move?” He asked carefully, not really sure how to word it.
Now it was Sergeant Aril’s turn to speak, “Move? What do you mean move? It is underground, where would it move to?”
“I guess I mean the land above it. Like, on Earth the land changes shape over time. Like, a really long time. We call it tectonics, the big plates of rock floating on the upper layer of the Earth’s molten insides get pushed around by the convective forces inside the planet.. at least I think that’s what it is. It has admittedly been a long time since I was in school.” he scratched the back of his neck as he said it.
Mursk seemed flabbergasted by the idea, even Jakiikii giving him a look like she still didn’t quite believe him despite having heard it from him before.
Mursk asked, “The planet.. moves. These plates of rock, how large are they?”
Paulie shrugged. “I don’t know. The biggest one is probably the size of Gike I would guess. I have no idea exactly, but there are a bunch of them.” He shrugged.
Sasfren shook her head. “Every day I talk to you is a new kind of horror. Imagine living on a geologically unstable planet. Why, it would make it impossible to grow static ecosystems. Evolution would go haywire, that might explain why your world seems so full of chaos.” She looked at him and squinted. “Paulie, what is it like?” He opened his mouth to give a reply but was cut off.
Paulie cocked his head as Jakiikii waved a hand at him. “I am sure it is crazy. Look how he turned out.”
As if that was all the answer the assembled aliens needed they made noises of agreement, Paulie frowned. Was he that odd to them? He thought about his exploits since arriving on the world. The things he had done. He nodded a little, yeah it was likely justified.
He just shrugged. “I don’t see the big deal, personally.”
Sasfren checked her communicator again a moment later, tapping at the small screen with her boneless fingers as Paulie scrutinised the holographic picture again from his seat at the small table. The lines of the old tunnels branched all over the city, most dense in the older part of the city. He knew for a fact that there were many more tunnels than these down there in the damp dark undercity, some may have been dug by the duigong. Most likely were just unplanned access tunnels, maintenance shafts or bypasses added over the years as the city grew and evolved over the years.
He remembered what Jakiikii had told him of the world, the city was hundreds of years old. Thousands of years by their own reckoning of time. There could be hidden paths that even the shadow dwellers did not know of.
Either way it was a lot of ground to cover, and if that really was the way these terrorists were getting around then it would be an absolute nightmare to flush them out. They would likely have already mapped large portions of the tunnel system around their main hideouts and would have an undeniable home field advantage, surely there had to be an easier way. He shook his head a little and then tuned back into what the others were saying. Sasfren was gesturing at the map and talking about data.
“We need to at least get some military survey teams down there to map things out. If for no other reason than to keep records up to date.” She gestured at him, “If what Paulie is saying is correct then there could be hiss-chirp of unmapped networks down there.”
Sasfren moved across the room, her slithering reminiscent of pacing. The air was still for a moment longer before she waved a hand. “I can’t do anything about it now. I will need to go to the precinct to requisition manpower and equipment. This needs to be looked into.” the alien female checked her commie again. “No response. I think I will head out, Aril, Mursk.. you have this covered in case Mack decides to show up?” There was a chorus of nods and affirmative noises.
Junior Detective Sasfren grabbed her coat from where she had placed it earlier and pulled it on, as she did so she looked at Jakiikii. Her expression petals turned deep green as she spoke, “Jakiikii. Be careful, there has been a lot of chaos lately. You and Paulie are vital to this investigation. And a target of these hostile forces, stay safe.”
“Yeah, you too.” Paulie said as she left in a hurry. The sound of her rough belly scales scraping across the floor fading quickly as the alien left and the door closed behind her.
Paulie and Jakiikii remained sitting, Aril stood near to the desk in the corner of the room as Mursk settled down. His insectoid legs curled as he took some manner of crouching position near to the door. Paulie looked around for something to do or say and after a moment of silence he stood and stretched his arms.
“Ohhh, man. You think Mack got too busy on something else and forgot to leave the complex?” He asked nobody in particular.
Sergeant Aril snorted, her long tail flicking his direction as if to accentuate her point. “Mack would forget his own quills were they not attached to his neck. Never have I ever had occasion to know a more forgetful soul that was also not a lazy waste of space.”
Paulie cocked his head. He wasn’t really sure if that had been the most backhanded compliment he had ever heard or if she was actually upset. It was pretty hard to tell most of the time what she was thinking. Her smooth, almost elf-like features seemed so emotionless most of the time, a tiny twitch of the lips or a slight raising of the brow. He was used to reading people having worked customer service for years, but she was about as easy to read as a Japanese dictionary dipped in ink.
Jakiikii came to the rescue however as she nodded. “Yes he is, but I love Mack dearly anyway. I know you do too.” She smiled at the rosy skinned nerivithian woman who just turned her head slightly and raised her chin. She kept her mouth closed, but he could have sworn he was that faint glimmer in her bright red eyes as the very corner of her mouth tugged into a microscopic smile.
Paulie wasn’t sure what to say in response. Mack was the closest thing he had to a friend on this strange alien world besides Jakiikii, but she was more than that to him. So he smiled.
He sat forward on his stool a bit as Jakiikii chimed in again. “So, as long as we are all just sitting around waiting for something to happen. When can we go on a walk outside the city limits?”
Aril immediately frowned and Mursk stepped forward slightly as he raised several hands. He chittered, the translator masking any emotional undertones he might have had. But it seemed from the volume of his alien speech that he might in fact be upset by the proposition.
“No, it can not be possible at this time. There is too much at stake and you are in far too much danger for me to allow you into such a vulnerable state. Far too many variable we can not control!” Paulie shrugged at the outburst. He wasn’t really expecting it to pan out, but he gave her props for trying anyway. He was just as tired as she from all this sitting around on their hands.
Jakiikii wasn’t letting it go that easily however and she folded all three pairs of arms over her chest as she let out a deep whoosh of air. Sucking in a large breath she spoke, her husky tenor rumbling from deep inside her chest cavity. “Why not? Are you going to keep us trapped like prisoners forever? We have done nothing wrong and we are fully capable of handling ourselves even without you.” She said it with passion, but Paulie could tell she was less angry and more so just frustrated.
Sergeant Aril shook her head, passing a long-fingered hand over her horns as she gestured towards the city map. “Because the danger has not yet passed. Think about what happened the last time you were both allowed to wander the city freely? Many lives were lost.”
Paulie spluttered in sudden indignation. “Wh-aat? That was hardly our fault and you well know it!”
Mursk stepped forward now, his hands clutching together as if in worry. “That is not the only issue. I do believe that we were followed at least a portion of the way here. There is little to no traffic on the road, and yet for a while our convoy was being tailed by an unmarked ground car. It looked like a standard delivery vehicle, but Hauxsu saw it make no stops nor did it deviate from its path until it became clear we were about to come to a halt. He made an attempt to follow it but lost track of it several blocks away.”
Paulie swallowed. “You think it was looking for us?”
“Looking.. found.. what I do know is that it was too much a coincidence that its path followed ours as closely.” Mursk tapped the side of his helmet in a knowing fashion, maybe a gesture that meant yes. Paulie wasn’t too sure. Before he could ask the royal guardsman what he meant, Aril got a ping on her commie. The device chiming insistently at her as the tall woman tapped at it in an effort to answer the alert.
“Yes, this is Aril. Go ahead.” A small, almost tinny sounding voice echoed from it in response to her prompt. He didn’t recognise it but she seemed to.
The voice spoke quickly, as if in a rush to get the words out. “Mack sends his apologies. He is not going to be able to make it away, too much to do. He recommended taking those two apocalypsers back to their residence. But be careful.”
“Careful of what?” She asked. But the link cut and she shook her head. “Damn secretaries, they give the message with no context at all. The Rozz would have done a better job.” She muttered.
“Well, we won’t know now will we? Come on, I am tired of sitting here.” Jakiikii complained. Paulie shook his head almost imperceptibly at her, mouth opening in silent question. Her current irritable mood was unlike her, he wondered if maybe she was picking it up from the other two. Being an empath she could be influenced by the emotions of those around her he had come to notice.
Mursk nodded and spoke to his squad. The door knocked before the medagoonian man opened it to reveal the same two defense force troopers he had seen earlier. They must have been called up to the floor when Sasfren left.
“We are leaving. Check the exits, meet us at the convoy.” They nodded, both throwing salutes before tromping off. Mursk watched them go for a moment before he waved two arms. “Come, we move. Stay silent, be quick.” He seemed much more on edge than he had been when they had first entered the structure earlier that morning.
Paulie nodded and glanced at Jakiikii, a slightly tense feeling charging the air. He felt safe, much safer than he had in a long time. But the revelation by Mursk of the potential hostile activity had kind of sunk in. Something in the dark was hunting him, inside and out.