Hellhole: Awakening by Brian Herbert, Kevin J. Anderson Page B
Authors: Brian Herbert, Kevin J. Anderson
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to leave Hellhole.…
In anticipation of increased space traffic through the Hellhole hub, construction teams were erecting two new lodging complexes—not quite luxury hotels, Adolphus thought, but they would improve in time. Dust that had been whipped up from dry lake beds drifted in gauzy brown clouds over the basin and settled in a fine grit across the landed vessels and the walkway. Adolphus wrinkled his nose at the powdery smell in the air, alkali mixed with exhaust fumes and volatile fuels. But it was the smell of industry, of progress.
Sophie accompanied him on the quick trip, ostensibly because she wanted to inspect the distribution operations. “I’ve hardly seen you this week,” she said as they walked from the landed flyer toward the towering gantries. “I’ve gone to three factories in the last two days, verifying their output, found spare parts for two retooled process lines in the weapons factories, and even visited mining operations.”
“You never struck me as the stay-at-home type anyway.”
“I’m not.” She took his arm. “I’ll make damn sure everything is ready so we can thumb our noses at the Constellation fleet when it arrives.”
Of the functional ships that Adolphus had so far incorporated into the DZ Defense Force, the bulk of them remained in Hellhole orbit to guard the stringline operations, while a large number had been distributed to other key worlds. When they departed after the telemancy demonstration, Tanja Hu and Ian Walfor took the six unfinished ships on a stringline hauler to Theser for the eccentric engineers there to install new stardrives. Then, when the ships were complete, Tanja would base them at her own planet of Candela as a first line of defense. Since the Diadem herself had decommissioned the stringline from Sonjeera to Buktu years ago, Walfor felt his own planetoid was safe enough, so he relinquished any claim on the ships he might have kept, sending them to other DZ worlds instead.
Adolphus gave Sophie a firm smile as they approached the spaceport operations building. The cubical structure was fashioned from fused silica bricks that gleamed in bright sunlight. “If the Urvanciks bring the intelligence I need,” he said, “I’m confident I can prevent the Constellation fleet from bothering us at all.”
At the door of the operations building, Rendo Theris welcomed the visitors. Short and muscular, Administrator Theris had very little hair on his head, just a few wisps of rusty red that stood up in the breeze. The spaceport administrator looked harried, his clothes wrinkled and smudged.
The man was not Adolphus’s first choice to manage the major spaceport, but the very competent team of Tel and Renny Clovis had been lost—Renny perished when a sinkhole had swallowed up the construction dozer he was driving; the tragedy had driven a grief-stricken Tel to immerse himself in slickwater and acquire a Xayan personality.
Before Theris could open the conversation with complaints, as he often did, Adolphus asked, “Are the Urvanciks on their way?”
“Descending now, sir. Their passenger pod is en route.” Theris wiped a hand across his brow, more focused on his own problems than Hellhole’s desperate situation. “I need help around here, General. Ankor is understaffed, and we can’t handle the increased traffic. We should beef up security, too—in case those strange ships come back.”
“More sightings?” Sophie asked. “Any idea what they were or where they came from?”
Two weeks earlier, a squadron of unidentified ships had streaked in from nowhere , darting over the Ankor complex. They moved like swift recon vessels, dodging the spaceport defenses. They had transmitted no message, made no contact whatsoever, then flitted away. When he first reviewed the alarming images, Adolphus was convinced the ships were Constellation spies, but his engineering experts had never seen the design before and could not understand any vessel that could perform
In anticipation of increased space traffic through the Hellhole hub, construction teams were erecting two new lodging complexes—not quite luxury hotels, Adolphus thought, but they would improve in time. Dust that had been whipped up from dry lake beds drifted in gauzy brown clouds over the basin and settled in a fine grit across the landed vessels and the walkway. Adolphus wrinkled his nose at the powdery smell in the air, alkali mixed with exhaust fumes and volatile fuels. But it was the smell of industry, of progress.
Sophie accompanied him on the quick trip, ostensibly because she wanted to inspect the distribution operations. “I’ve hardly seen you this week,” she said as they walked from the landed flyer toward the towering gantries. “I’ve gone to three factories in the last two days, verifying their output, found spare parts for two retooled process lines in the weapons factories, and even visited mining operations.”
“You never struck me as the stay-at-home type anyway.”
“I’m not.” She took his arm. “I’ll make damn sure everything is ready so we can thumb our noses at the Constellation fleet when it arrives.”
Of the functional ships that Adolphus had so far incorporated into the DZ Defense Force, the bulk of them remained in Hellhole orbit to guard the stringline operations, while a large number had been distributed to other key worlds. When they departed after the telemancy demonstration, Tanja Hu and Ian Walfor took the six unfinished ships on a stringline hauler to Theser for the eccentric engineers there to install new stardrives. Then, when the ships were complete, Tanja would base them at her own planet of Candela as a first line of defense. Since the Diadem herself had decommissioned the stringline from Sonjeera to Buktu years ago, Walfor felt his own planetoid was safe enough, so he relinquished any claim on the ships he might have kept, sending them to other DZ worlds instead.
Adolphus gave Sophie a firm smile as they approached the spaceport operations building. The cubical structure was fashioned from fused silica bricks that gleamed in bright sunlight. “If the Urvanciks bring the intelligence I need,” he said, “I’m confident I can prevent the Constellation fleet from bothering us at all.”
At the door of the operations building, Rendo Theris welcomed the visitors. Short and muscular, Administrator Theris had very little hair on his head, just a few wisps of rusty red that stood up in the breeze. The spaceport administrator looked harried, his clothes wrinkled and smudged.
The man was not Adolphus’s first choice to manage the major spaceport, but the very competent team of Tel and Renny Clovis had been lost—Renny perished when a sinkhole had swallowed up the construction dozer he was driving; the tragedy had driven a grief-stricken Tel to immerse himself in slickwater and acquire a Xayan personality.
Before Theris could open the conversation with complaints, as he often did, Adolphus asked, “Are the Urvanciks on their way?”
“Descending now, sir. Their passenger pod is en route.” Theris wiped a hand across his brow, more focused on his own problems than Hellhole’s desperate situation. “I need help around here, General. Ankor is understaffed, and we can’t handle the increased traffic. We should beef up security, too—in case those strange ships come back.”
“More sightings?” Sophie asked. “Any idea what they were or where they came from?”
Two weeks earlier, a squadron of unidentified ships had streaked in from nowhere , darting over the Ankor complex. They moved like swift recon vessels, dodging the spaceport defenses. They had transmitted no message, made no contact whatsoever, then flitted away. When he first reviewed the alarming images, Adolphus was convinced the ships were Constellation spies, but his engineering experts had never seen the design before and could not understand any vessel that could perform
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