Interrogative 01: Tiago and the Masterless by Charles Barouch Read Free Book Online

buildings inside. Heat signatures indicated that the location was in active use. Tiago stifled a yawn and rubbed his eyes as he reviewed the data. Applying human standards, it probably could hold several hundred people.
    "Do we know what the atmosphere in the dome is like? Have we found an entry point?" Tiago asked.
    "Mass spectrometer is limited at this distance. Light absorption and other tests show a high probability that it is a close match for the surface atmo. No airlock found so far," she said.
    "Radio chatter?"
    "None detected. But, we haven't been paying attention to the moon for very long," Six-six-four replied.
    He could hear the 'told you so' in her voice.
    Tiago still couldn't reconcile the idea of a moon colony. Why grow crops on the planet but not live there? Why put up missiles to defend the planet if you don't need the food? He worked through the alternatives as they occurred to him: Maybe they had periodic shipments of food up from the planet. Interrogative hadn't detected one, but they hadn't been watching for very long.
    Or, maybe the planet was like a national park or a living specimen collection. The idea of a tourist destination the size of a planet amused him. Even with jump technology, he couldn't imagine a lot of interstellar visitors. There had to be something else to it.
    "Maybe you don't need other people," Six-six-four said, interrupting his thoughts.
    "Oh?"
    "Scanning the planet, dealing with the missiles; it makes you happy. Maybe you just need the possibility of people," she said.
    He didn't know what to say to that. Was she saying it because her new sense of self was offended that she wasn't enough for him? Or did this come from a more analytical place? Or was this an attempt to dissuade him from risking his safety? No matter what her reason, Tiago thought, it's interesting that she didn't let it stop her from finding the people for him. While she advised against his plan, she still moved it forward. Captain Tiago Salazar might have to promote Lieutenant Audra Manuel.
    'See, you're smiling," Six-six-four said.
    "We have almost enough salvage from the missiles to build a brain for the second maker unit."
    He regretted the words as soon as he said them. Those plans were tied up in her looping reboot problem. Fortunately, she didn't glitch this time; she responded.
    "You were going to show those to me. Where are they?" she asked.
    "I wouldn't want to show them to you in the state they're in. Let me clean my notes up a bit first." Tiago said.
    Tiago walked over to the helm and started researching. It seemed that the easiest way to get to the populated moon would be to break synchronous orbit and let the moon come to him. He could just point the ship there and use the sublight engines, but the other approach appealed to him for several reasons. First, he liked the doing the math. Astrogation had always held a fascination for him. Second, he felt that bearing down on the domed city under power might seem threatening. Third, he wasn't sure what he intended to do yet. This method would take three hours to get him there.
    "We broke orbit. Change your mind about go landing not?" Six-six-four said.
    Go landing not. Another vocal glitch for the list.
    "Not a true break. We are now in asynchronous orbit. We stay still relative to the sun instead of planet-relative. Now Manhattan comes to Mohammad," Tiago said.
    "Manhattan comes to Mohammad? What does that mean?" Six-six-four asked.
    "I don't know. It's just something my Grandma Jo used to say. I think it's a religious reference. All I meant was that the populated moon will move here. Its orbit will bring it right to us."
    Six-six-four looked like she had more questions, but she turned back to her station without asking any of them. Tiago wasn't sure what to make of that. He went back to his plan for the second maker. He had to modify it before she saw it. It was his immediate priority.
    "Moon in range," she said.
    "That should take three hours. Can't be